THE  AVON 

AND 


COUNTRY 


A  .G.  BRADLEY, 


stat:  teacher  s  c  l      t 

SAi^A  iARBARA.  eALIFuBrtlA 

11U..U 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2008  with  funding  from 

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THE    AVON    AND 
SHAKESPEARE'S    COUNTRY 


THE  AVON 

AND    SHAKESPEARE'S 

COUNTRY 


A    G.    BRADLEY 

AUTHOR    OF    "the    ROMANCE   OF    NORTHUMBERLAND"    ETC. 


WITH   THIRTY    ILLUSTRATIONS   IN    COLOUR    BY 

A.    R.    QUINTON 


NEW    YORK 
E.    P.    DUTTON   AND    COMPANY 

31    WEST    TWENTY-THIRD    STREET 
1910 


K^f^W'-'Anl 


PREFACE 

T  N  regard  to  the  slightly  ampler  space  devoted 
-*-  in  these  pages  to  the  lower  and  less  known 
than  to  the  higher  and  more  familiar  reaches  of 
the  Avon,  I  need  not  support  such  a  procedure 
by  any  pious  opinion  of  my  own,  that,  upon 
the  whole,  the  former  are  the  most  consistently 
engaging,  and  associated  with  more  inspiring 
landscape  and  no  less  rich  in  historic  association. 
For  ample  justification  will  be  afforded  by  a  mere 
reference  to  the  voluminous  output  of  works  of 
all  kinds  which,  for  obvious  reasons,  have  dealt 
with  the  immediate  Stratford  district  from  almost 
every  conceivable  point  of  view. 

Furthermore,  I  have  been  emboldened  to  fancy 
that  an  intimacy  of  old  standing  with  America 
and  Americans  has  conduced  to  a  more  sym- 
pathetic understanding  of  the  impressions  that 
most  England  makes  on  our  kinsmen  from  across 
the  Atlantic,  who  form  so  important  a  feature 
in  the  tide  of  travel  that  sets  annually  to  the 
banks  of  Avon.  Though  with  no  especial  design 
in  these  pages  on  the  transatlantic  reader  of 
whatever  allegiance,  I  have  indulged  in  the  hope 


vi    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

that  they  may  be  the  means  of  persuading  some 
to  extend  their  Stratford  pilgrimage  a  Httle 
farther,  and  make  time  to  descend  the  valley 
of  the  Avon  with  as  much  leisure  as  may  be 
to  its  mouth  at  Tewkesbury,  and  gain  thereby 
as  felicitous  a  glimpse  of  genuine,  unspoiled 
rural  England   as   could   anywhere,   perhaps,  be 

found. 

A.  G.  B. 

Rye, 

Sussex. 


CONTENTS 


CHAP. 

I.  Tewkesbury 
II.  Up-Stream  to  Bredon 

III.  Bredon  to  Evesham  . 

IV.  Below  the  Cotswolds 
V.  The  Lower  Vale  of  Evesham 

VI.  The  Upper  Vale  of  Evesham 
VII.  Evesham  to  Stratford 
VIII.  Stratford-on-Avon    . 
IX.  To  Compton  Winyates  and  Edgehill 
X.  Stratford  to  Warwick 
XI.  Warwick  and  Kenilworth  . 
XII.  Rugby     ..... 
Index      ..... 


I 

36 

72 
109 

137 
169 
198 

233 
264 
291 
310 
340 
361 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 


Trinity  Church,  Stratford-on-Avon 


Abbey  Church,  Tewkesbury 

High  Street,  Tewkesbury. 

Old  Bridge,  Tewkesbury  . 

Twining  Ferry,  with  Bredon 

EcKiNGTON  Cross 

Great  Comberton     . 

Pershore  Bridge 

Cropthorne  Post  Office    . 

Bell  Tower,  Evesham 

Vale  of  Evesham 

Ford  at  Harvington 

Cleeve  Mill  and  Weir 

Pebworth 

The  Old  Falcon  Inn,  Bidford 

Welford  Mill  and  Weir  . 

Shakespeare's  Birthplace. 

Grammar  School,  Stratford-on-Avon 

Anne  Hathaway's  Cottage,  Shottery 

Charlecote  Hall,  from  the  River 

Hampton  Lucy 

Warwick  Castle,  from  below  the  Bridge 

Warwick  Castle,  the  Entrance  Court 

Warwick  Castle,  Italian  Garden 

Leicester's  Hospital,  Warwick    . 

The  Quadrangle,  Leicester's  Hospital,  Warwick 

Guy's  Cliff 

Kenilworth  Castle. 

Gatehouse,  Stoneleigh  Abbey 

Bubbenhall  Mill 


Frontispiece 


FACING   PAGE 


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THE  AVON  AND 
SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 


CHAPTER   I 
TEWKESBURY 

THE  composition  of  the  picture  in  which  Tewkes- 
bury forms  the  central  feature,  as  unfolded 
to  the  traveller  descending  the  Severn  valley,  is  singu- 
larly felicitous.  For  the  mile  or  so  of  uncompromis- 
ing meadow  flats,  bare  of  either  house  or  tree  or  fence, 
which  marks  the  confluence  of  the  Severn  and  the 
Avon  between  the  low  bordering  slopes,  seems  to 
make  for  the  better  setting  and  greater  glory  of  the 
noble  pile  that  rises  upon  the  farther  edge.  Indeed, 
the  scenery  hereabouts  is  altogether  laid  upon  a 
broad  canvas,  as  befits  the  greatest  of  English  rivers, 
drawing  within  measurable  distance  of  the  tide.  The 
long  range  of  the  Cotswolds  forges  up  from  the  far 
south-east  and,  drawing  within  a  few  miles  of  Tewkes- 
bury, swerves  away  to  the  south-west  and  the  bolder 
heights  of  Cleeve,  thence  dropping  in  successive  and 
gradually  fading  headlands  into  the  verdant  plain 
which  spreads  from  Tewkesbury  to  Gloucester,  and 
through  which  the  Severn  meanders  seaward.  Iso- 
lated heights   of   no   mean   altitude,   outliers   of   the 


2   THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

Cotswolds,  rise  picturesquely  and  inconsequently 
behind  the  old  town,  and  not  far  away  from  it,  while 
up  the  tributary  river  to  the  eastward,  the  huge 
humpy  mass  of  Bredon  fills  the  eye  and  proclaims 
itself,  as  most  assuredly  it  is,  the  dominant  feature 
in  the  whole  Avon  valley.  Along  the  southern  bank 
of  the  smaller  river,  and  no  distance  from  its  mouth, 
the  ancient  little  town  extends  itself  between  the 
same  limits  practically  as  marked  it  two  or  three 
centuries  ago  :  while  at  the  western  end,  rising  above 
a  girdle  of  foliage,  the  long  massive  nave  of  the  abbey, 
surmounted  by  one  of  the  finest  Norman  towers  in 
England,  makes  a  scene  that  seems  to  celebrate  with 
singular  distinction  the  union  of  two  famous  streams, 

Tewkesbury  is  hardly  the  place  you  would  of  choice 
resort  to  if  it  had  been  raining  for  a  week.  It  is  one 
that  deals  notoriously  in  floods,  and  even  in  photog- 
raphy does  not  shrink  from  representing  itself  as 
given  over  wholly  to  the  dominion  of  great  waters. 
The  natives  show  you  watermarks  treasured  in  their 
back  gardens,  or  on  their  kitchen  doors,  touched  by 
the  combined  efforts  of  Severn  and  the  Avon  on 
various  memorable  occasions,  each  of  which  serve 
as  mental  finger-posts  in  the  flight  of  a  time,  and  help 
to  place  the  date  of  a  birth,  a  marriage,  a  new  curate, 
or  an  attack  of  influenza.  Nor  would  it  be  well  to 
fix  on  Tewkesbury  for  a  month  of  sunny  June  or  July 
days,  since  it  is  one  of  the  hottest  little  places  within 
my  knowledge.  Indeed,  the  general  atmosphere  of  the 
lower  Severn  valley  is  perhaps  as  ill-adapted  to  the 
strenuous  life,  for  the  alien  at  least,  as  any  in  England, 
while  Tewkesbury  itself,  lying  on  the  river  flat,  has 
not  a  particle  of  shade  worth  mentioning  within  its 
venerable  limits,  except  the  pleasant  groves  that 
screen  the  abbey  precincts.     But  as  here  you  may 


TEWKESBURY  3 

not  walk  or  sit  upon  the  well-kept  turf  beneath  them, 
and  cannot  well  lie  upon  the  pavement  walks  to  any 
comfort  or  advantage,  I  should  not  recommend  this 
interesting  little  town  to  those  who  foUow  the  pipe- 
and-hammock,  or  book-and-campstool  method  of  en- 
countering such  after  all  but  moderate  suns  as  shine 
upon  the  Briton.  As  few  readers  of  this  little  work 
are  ever  likely  to  consider  the  question  of  a  month 
in  Tewkesbury,  these  discouraging  comments  are  no 
doubt  irrelevant  and  only  excusable  from  the  fact 
that,  despite  the  seeming  paradox,  I  spent  an  exceed- 
ingly pleasant  one  myself  beneath  the  shadow,  speaking 
figuratively,  of  course,  after  what  I  have  said,  of  its 
noble  pile.  I  spent  it,  too,  with  the  jolly  miller  of  the 
ancient  abbey  mill  and  his  even  jollier  wife.  Not  in 
the  mill,  the  interior  of  which,  I  must  admit,  has  been 
shorn  of  all  romance  in  the  exigencies  of  modern 
science,  but  in  a  snug  and  modest  cot  hard  by,  whose 
garden  strip  bent  downwards  to  Shakespeare's  Avon, 
purling  just  here  below  the  mill  wheel,  as  if  it  had 
come  from  Wales  rather  than  from  Warwickshire 
— a  garden  strip  that,  like  the  rest,  had  of  course  its 
floodmarks,  which  happily  were  not  even  threatened 
in  those  long  and  sunny  days. 

Speaking,  however,  in  all  gravity,  Tewkesbury  is 
an  admirable  centre  for  exploring  a  district  rich  in 
history,  in  fine  churches,  in  ancient  houses,  in  village 
architecture,  and  much  above  the  average;  over  a 
radius  of  a  dozen  or  fifteen  miles,  in  physical  beauty. 
There  are  two  hotels,  the  one  Georgian  and  sedate  of 
complexion,  where  I  should  imagine  the  more  fastidious 
souls  would  be  happy  and  at  ease.  There  are  others 
that  rank  high  among  the  black  and  white  Tudor 
buildings  of  the  west  Midlands  and  the  Border  country, 
and  are  beautiful  to  behold,  but  more  popular  perhaps 


4   THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

with  the  merry  tripper,  who  comes  in  shoals  from  the 
Midland  towns  to  Tewkesbury  in  his  active  season. 
But  when  the  wheels  of  his  loaded  chariots  have 
whisked  him  away,  or  in  the  autumn,  winter,  and 
spring,  when  he  is  watching  football  matches  in 
Birmingham,  Tewkesbury  is  as  if  he  had  never  been, 
and  shows  no  sign  of  being  itself  anything  whatever 
but  an  ancient  market  town,  somewhat  shorn  of  any 
little  importance  it  may  have  had  by  the  passing  of 
railroads  at  a  distance,  for  it  is  only  linked  to  the 
main  line  by  a  branch.  The  town  consists  of  three 
streets,  which  form  a  rude  Y,  and  there  is  practically 
nothing  more.  It  boasts,  however,  of  more  half- 
timbered  Tudor  houses  for  its  size  than  any  other 
town  in  this  region  of  England  from  Cheshire  to 
Gloucester,  and  from  Warwick  to  the  west  limits  of 
Hereford,  which  is  so  distinguished  for  them.  I  know 
all  these  towns,  and  should  certainly  give  Tewkesbury, 
in  this  respect,  the  palm.  But  what  is  much  more 
convincing,  its  rivals  themselves  are  inclined  to  admit 
its  superiority  in  their  confidential  m"'ments.  Tewkes- 
bury has  no  suburbs,  no  outlying  red  brick  villas 
worth  mentioning.  Its  three  streets  end  virtually 
where  they  ended  in  ancient  times,  and  precipitate 
you  almost  without  warning  into  the  green  fields.  Its 
burghers  live  mostly  over  or  beside  their  shops,  and 
sometimes  in  houses  that  are  a  joy  to  behold.  But 
Tewkesbury  is  not  without  self  -  consciousness  and 
pride.  It  does  not  altogether  follow  these  picturesque 
methods  from  belated  habits.  There  has  been  some 
restoration,  but  generally  by  loving,  careful,  and 
knowledgeable  hands.  The  town  has  no  trade  to 
speak  of  save  a  couple  of  flour  mills  on  the  Avon,  but 
there  is  a  civic  sense  of  architectural  continuity  rare 
enough  in  England.     In  short,  there  is  no  expanding 


TEWKESBURY  5 

industrial  prospect  whatever,  and  the  enlightened 
native  feels  that,  as  a  bit  of  old  England  in  these 
feverish  days  of  travel,  the  mission  of  his  town,  as 
well  as  its  most  promising  industry,  is  to  maintain 
that  character  as  studiously  as  may  be  ;  to  preserve, 
in  short,  a  stage  upon  which  the  flamboyant  modern, 
with  his  usually  resounding  presence,  whether  com- 
placent motorist,  or  exuberant  beanfeaster,  may 
make  survey  of  his  complete  antithesis,  and  himself 
supply  a  contrast  between  the  then  and  now.  This 
is  a  new  resource  and  a  worthy  one  by  which,  within 
the  last  two  decades,  many  a  sleepy  old  English  town 
has  in  part  repaired  the  loss  of  other  vanished  trades. 
It  is  not  as  lucrative  as  nails  or  gloves,  boilers  or 
boots.  But  it  is  steady,  nay,  even  improving  and 
independent  of  the  world's  commercial  convulsions. 
It  does  not  promote  national  wealth,  with  the  squalid 
accessories  and  interludes  of  unemployment  con- 
tingent on  that  process,  except  to  the  negative  extent 
of  keeping  a  certain  amount  of  money  in  the  country 
that  would  be  spent  on  the  foreigner,  and  perhaps  of 
encouraging  the  latter  to  return  an  infinitesimal  but 
increasing  fraction  of  the  enormous  sums  John  Bull 
has  in  the  past  lavished  upon  him  and  his  for  like 
hospitalities. 

It  was  like  old  times  to  me,  if  a  few  paltry  years 
may  be  thus  apostrophized  and  the  phrase  permitted 
in  such  a  haunt  of  ancient  heroes  as  Tewkesbury,  to 
shake  once  again  the  mailed  fist  of  Robert  Fitzhamon, 
in  whose  company,  to  pursue  still  further  such  dis- 
respectful metaphor,  I  had  wandered  so  often  and  so 
far  among  the  hills  and  castles  of  South  Wales.  That 
the  conqueror  of  Glamorgan  lay  at  Tewkesbury  as 
the  virtual  builder  of  its  great  and  powerful  abbey, 
came  back  to  me  as  a  surprise  with  all  the  contrition 


6      THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

in  this  case  incumbent  on  so  inexcusable  a  lapse  of 
memory.  That  the  first  Earl  of  Gloucester,  the  first 
bearer  of  a  title  whose  successors  for  three  centuries 
were  for  territorial  reasons  so  often  pHmi  inter  pares 
among  the  feudal  nobility,  should  lie  here  is  natural 
enough.  How  many  of  the  thousands,  however,  who 
stand  beside  the  chantry  that  a  pious  abbot  of  much 
later  day  erected  to  Fitzhamon's  memory  above  his 
tomb,  think  of  him  otherwise  than  dimly  as  an  Earl 
of  Gloucester,  a  kinsman  of  the  Conqueror's,  as  their 
guide-book  tells  them,  who  was  killed  in  a  battle  in 
Normandy,  in  short,  of  small  concern  to  Britons  then 
or  now.  Pilgrims  from  beyond  the  Severn,  however, 
who  know  anything  at  all,  will  see  in  the  founder  of 
Tewkesbury  Abbey  the  conqueror  of  the  land  of 
Morgan,  that  fattest  slice  of  Wales,  which  gave  this 
Earldom  of  Gloucester,  as  its  appanage,  the  excess 
of  fighting  strength  that  made  it  ever  afterwards  so 
unduly  powerful.  But  this  is  a  highly  romantic  story, 
of  which  a  word  may  be  said  in  a  more  appropriate 
place. 

The  germ  of  Tewkesbury  is  attributed  to  the  planting 
of  a  rude  church  here  in  the  end  of  the  seventh  century 
by  one  of  the  early  Saxon  devotees,  by  name  Theocus, 
hence  Theocus-bury  and  Tewkesbury.  Soon  after- 
wards a  monastery  of  some  sort  was  founded  and 
endowed,  which  by  the  ninth  century  was  of  sufficient 
importance  to  be  selected  as  the  burial  place  of 
Brihtric,  King  of  Mercia,  whose  wife,  having  poisoned 
most  of  his  friends  from  jealousy  or  mere  malignancy, 
at  length  gave  her  husband  himself  a  dose  in  a  fit  of 
sheer  abstraction.  The  Tewkesbury  House  was  in 
the  tenth  century  associated  with  the  Benedictine 
monastery  of  Cranbourne,  and  how  it  fared  during 
the  ravages  of  the  Danes  no  one  may  guess.     There 


TEWKESBURY  7 

is  little  concerning  it  worthy  of  mention  here  till  it 
passed,  after  the  Conquest,  into  Norman  hands  and 
arose  in  mightier  guise  and  to  a  far  greater  measure 
of  renown  than  in  Saxon  days  it  had  ever  aspired  to. 
A  curious  tale  that  even  Freeman's  searching  criticism 
and  keen  scent  for  fiction  does  not  wholly  reject 
belongs  to  the  transfer  of  Tewkesbury  Manor  and  its 
church  patronage.  Now  at  Hanley  Castle,  up  the 
Severn  towards  Worcester,  lived  a  Saxon  thane  also 
Brihtric,  like  the  luckless  king  already  spoken  of, 
though  I  will  not  guarantee  that  their  signatures  were 
precisely  identical.  After  the  Conquest  he  was  left, 
like  many  other  Saxons  in  this  part  of  the  world,  in 
possession  of  his  manors,  which  included  Tewkesbury. 
But  Brihtric,  in  the  time  of  Edward  the  Confessor,  had 
been  sent  on  a  mission  by  that  king  to  the  court  of 
the  Earl  of  Flanders,and  while  there  the  earl's  daughter, 
afterwards  wife  of  the  Conqueror,  had  shown  a  par- 
tiality for  his  handsome  person,  to  which  favour  he 
committed  the  unforgettable  insult  of  remaining 
wholly  indifferent.  When  the  lady  ultimately  came 
to  England  as  William's  wife,  the  hapless  Brihtric 
had  a  bad  time  of  it,  was  thrown  into  prison  and 
stripped  of  the  possessions  he  seemed  in  a  fair  way 
of  retaining,  among  them  Tewkesbury,  which  became 
royal  property.  Thence  it  passed  in  due  course  to 
William  Rufus,  who  bestowed  it  on  his  father's  friend, 
Robert  Fitzhamon,  Earl  of  Gloucester.  Though  the 
Avon  is  not  in  Glamorgan,  the  performance  with  which 
the  founder  of  Tewkesbury  is  indelibly  associated,  and 
by  the  fame  of  which  he  lives  to  this  day  in  Wales, 
as  none  of  his  contemporaries  but  the  king  himself 
have  lived  in  England,  was  achieved  from  here. 

Now  in  the  time  of  Rufus  no  part  of  Wales  was  in 
any  tangible  sense  as  yet  conquered,  and  the  struggle 


8   THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

then  began  which  was  not  completed  for  two  hundred 
years,  when  the  last  Llewelyn  was  killed  at  Builth. 
The  king's  method  was  economical  and  simple,  but 
gave  rise  to  centuries  of  after  complications.  It 
consisted  in  licensing  certain  of  his  barons  to  adventure 
upon  their  own  account  and  hold  such  territory  as 
they  could  keep  by  the  sword  as  independent  Palatines, 
owing  little  more  than  nominal  allegiance  to  the 
sovereign.  Much  of  Mid  and  South  Wales  was  thus 
annexed,  and  more  or  less  precariously  held  in  "  lord- 
ships ",  a  form  of  division  and  government  which 
lasted,  with  modification,  till  Henry  the  Eighth's  time, 
when  the  "  Marches",  as  they  were  called,  were  made 
or  grouped  into  counties.  Morganwg,  or  Glamorgan, 
was  the  richest  and  fairest  plum  of  all.  The  tale 
runs  that  in  this  instance  divisions  among  its  native 
chiefs  provoked  one  of  them  to  call  in  Norman  aid 
in  the  person  of  Fitzhamon,  Earl  of  Gloucester,  with 
the  result,  to  put  an  intricate  story  in  brief,  that  the 
allies,  having  crushed  the  other  party,  the  Normans 
turned  upon  their  hosts  and  drove  them  into  the 
hill  portions,  keeping  the  fair  sea  coast  lowland  for 
themselves.  Fitzhamon  had  engaged  the  services  of 
twelve  knights  with  their  foUowings,  and  these  found 
their  reward  in  the  partition  of  Glamorgan  in  the 
manner  related ;  and  upon  each  sub-lordship  the 
grantee  built  a  castle,  some  of  which,  in  ruins  or  rebuilt, 
are  standing  to  this  day.  We  know,  moreover,  all 
these  knights'  names,  and  several  families  still  bearing 
them  and  boasting  their  blood  were  seated  on  the 
original  grants  till  not  very  long  ago.  One  or  two  are 
there  even  yet.  Fitzhamon  kept  for  himself  the  best 
share,  that  of  Cardiff,  setting  up  there  a  castle  and  a 
central  government.  And  he  remained  the  overlord 
of  all  Glamorgan,  a  position  which  became  annexed 


TEWKESBURY  9 

to  the  Earldom  of  Gloucester.  And  as  the  Glamorgan- 
Norman  families  were  always  fighting  the  half  subdued 
Welsh  and  sometimes  one  another,  a  swarm  of  hardy, 
trained  soldiers — Anglo-Normans,  and  as  time  went 
on  reconciled  or  hired  Welshmen — were  at  the  service 
of  the  great  baronial  house. 

Fitzhamon's  headquarters  were  at  Gloucester  Castle, 
but  he  and  his  successors  had  also  what  the  chronicler 
implies  was  a  stately  house  at  Tewkesbury,  on  the 
site  known  as  Holme  Castle,  close  to  the  abbey. 
Fitzhamon  died  of  wounds  received  in  battle  abroad 
in  1 197;  but  he  lived  to  see  the  great  monastery 
and  church  sufficiently  completed  to  admit  of  nearly 
sixty  monks  being  transferred  thither  from  Cran- 
bourne,  which  henceforward  became  a  cell  of 
Tewkesbury.  The  abbey  was  dedicated  with  great 
ceremonial  in  the  year  1123.  Fitzhamon  in  the  mean- 
time had  left  no  son,  and  his  daughter  Mabel,  prob- 
ably the  greatest  heiress  in  England,  was  bestowed  by 
Richard  the  First  on  his  eldest  natural  son  Robert, 
by  his  ward,  the  beautiful  Nesta,  daughter  of  Rhys 
ap  Tudor,  and  afterwards  wife  of  Gerald  de  Windsor. 
This  lady  is  known  as  the  "  Helen  of  Wales",  and 
with  good  reason,  for  seas  of  blood  were  shed  on  her 
account  in  that  country.  But  I  must  check  these 
excursions  across  the  Severn,  only  noting  by  the  way 
that  when  this  practical  young  woman,  Mabel  of 
Gloucester,  heard  that  the  bastard  Robert  had  only 
one  name,  she  is  said  to  have  remarked  that  as  he  was 
taking  her  for  what  she  had  and  not  for  what  she  was, 
he  ought  at  least  to  have  two.  For  a  damsel  bred 
in  a  twelfth  century  Border  castle  this  would  seem  a 
creditable  display  of  caustic  humour.  So  the  fortunate 
bridegroom  provided  himself  with  two  names,  and 
became  Robert  Fitz  le  Roy.     But  the  young  woman 


10    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

had  not  even  then  quite  finished  with  him,  and,  Uke 
most  people  of  discretion,  beHeving  there  to  be  much 
in  a  name,  insisted  on  knowing  precisely  what  that  of 
their  eldest  son  was  to  be.  Being  informed  that  he 
would  most  assuredly  be  Robert,  Earl  of  Gloucester, 
she  intimated  that  matters  might  now  be  proceeded 
with.  Her  husband.  Earl  Robert,  proved  an  entire 
success,  a  man  both  of  might  and  learning,  who, 
among  other  worthy  exploits,  put  the  finishing  touches 
to  the  abbey.  I  must  not  try  the  reader's  patience 
too  greatly  with  the  chronicle  of  the  famous  dynasty 
of  Gloucester  and  Glamorgan,  of  which  the  honour  of 
Tewkesbury  formed  so  vital  a  part  ;  but  in  two 
generations  another  heiress  carried  everything  away 
with  her,  and  was  appropriated  by  King  John  before 
his  accession,  and  afterwards  divorced  for  his  better 
known  match,  a  mean  business  possibly  and  just  like 
the  man.  Still  she  proved  childless,  and  the  meaner 
proceeding  was  to  keep  her  as  did  John,  a  quasi- 
widow  and  the  Earldom  of  Gloucester  vacant — since 
he  could  not  hold  it  without  her — for  years,  that  he 
might  enjoy  its  revenues.  But  this  was  John  all 
over,  and  whatever  stood  for  public  opinion  in  those 
days  put  an  end  at  length  to  the  intolerable  scandal, 
and  the  lady  was  married,  but  only  to  go  childless  still 
and  almost  simultaneously  with  her  husband  to  an 
early  grave.  Through  a  collateral  source  the  great 
house  of  Clare  now  succeeded  to  the  Earldom  of 
Gloucester  and  Lordship  of  Tewkesbury.  For  nearly 
a  century  they  made  it  a  power  in  the  land.  "  No 
family  ",  says  a  great  historian,  "  approached  them 
in  power  ",  Most  of  them,  moreover,  laid  their  bones 
in  Tewkesbury  beneath  magnificent  monuments  that 
have,  alas,  vanished.  The  last  of  the  Clares  fell  at 
Bannockburn  in  dramatic  fashion  ;    for,  while  hotly 


TEWKESBURY  ii 

disputing  his  right  by  inheritance  to  lead  the  vanguard 
with  his  Border  neighbour  de  Bohun,  Constable  of 
England,  who  as  such  claimed  the  honour,  he  ended 
the  dispute  by  galloping  alone  and  recklessly  against 
the  foe  to  instant  death.  This  fate  would  most 
assuredly  not  have  been  his  had  he  not  in  his  hot 
haste  forgotten  his  surcoat  with  its  armorial  bearings. 
For  the  ransom  of  a  Clare  would  have  been  a  windfall 
indeed  to  a  Scottish  captor. 

Once  more  in  these  sanguinary  days,  when  rich 
widows  and  heiresses  were  so  continually  in  the 
market,  the  honours  passed  to  a  girl,  though  in  this 
case  to  more  than  one,  Tewkesbury  with  Gloucester 
going  to  Eleanor.  This  lady  married  Edward  the 
Second's  favourite,  Hugh  Despenser,  who  thus  became 
eleventh  earl.  For  nearly  a  century  it  remained  with 
the  Despensers,  and  for  the  abbey  church  it  was  the 
most  important  period  of  all,  since  during  it  the  nave 
and  choir  were  almost  rebuilt.  In  1414  the  male  line 
again  ran  out,  and  through  Isobel,  a  sister  of  the  last 
earl,  the  honours  went  by  marriage  to  Richard  Beau- 
champ,  Earl  of  Warwick,  afterwards  Regent  of  France. 
Both  dying,  a  young  son,  Henry,  remained,  with  whom 
the  weak  King  Henry  the  Sixth  was  infatuated, 
creating  him  in  boyhood  premier  earl  and  "  King  of 
the  Isle  of  Wight  and  the  Channel  Islands  ",  whatever 
that  mystic  title  may  have  amounted  to.  The  weight 
of  his  honours  apparently  brought  the  poor  youth 
to  an  untimely  grave,  though  he  had  married  Cicely, 
sister  of  Warwick  the  king-maker,  to  whom,  in  addition 
to  his  other  vast  possessions,  the  honours  of  Gloucester 
and  Tewkesbury  fell.  At  his  death,  on  Barnet  field, 
Isobel  his  daughter  got  Tewkesbury  in  her  share,  carry- 
ing it  to  her  husband,  the  ill-fated  Duke  of  Clarence, 
soon  after  which  the  estates  passed  to  the  Crown. 


12    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

If  some  excuse  be  needed  for  such  a  dose  of  genealogy 
it  may  be  found  in  the  fact  that  the  dust  of  many, 
if  not  most  of  these  illustrious  persons,  lies  beneath 
Tewkesbury  Abbey.  And  though  much  remains  to 
mark  their  graves  with  becoming  splendour,  it  is 
quite  certain  that  the  shameless  Philistines  of  the 
Dissolution  period,  and  the  half-plunderers,  half- 
fanatics  of  the  Civil  War  have  destroyed  much  more. 
For  during  the  restoration  work  some  thirty  years  ago, 
careful  search  was  made  beneath  the  chancel  floor 
and  fragments  of  painted  sculpture  were  discovered, 
supposed  to  have  belonged  to  the  reredos.  Among 
these  were  portions  of  the  figures  of  Earl  Robert,  son 
of  Henry  the  First,  who  married  the  satirical  daughter 
of  Fitzhamon,  another  of  William,  Earl  of  Gloucester, 
part  of  a  figure  of  Gilbert  de  Clare,  the  Red  Earl,  and 
a  similar  fragment  identified  as  belonging  to  Thomas 
Despenser.  There  was  also  a  portion  of  the  figure 
of  Gilbert,  the  last  de  Clare  who  was  killed,  as  related, 
at  Bannockburn,  holding  in  his  hand  an  inverted  torch 
signifying  the  extinction  of  the  male  line.  The  vault 
under  the  Despenser  monument  was  explored  and 
disclosed  the  body  of  Hugh,  the  third  of  the  Despensers, 
in  a  leaden  coffin,  and  near  by  the  perfect  skeleton 
of  Lady  Despenser,  who  died  a  little  later  in  1350, 
while  the  bones  of  many  of  the  de  Clares,  including 
those  of  the  Bannockburn  hero,  which  showed  him  to 
have  been  a  six-foot  man,  were  found  in  their  proper 
places.  The  most  interesting  discovery  of  this  kind 
was  the  embalmed  body  of  Isabella,  daughter  of 
Thomas  Despenser,  the  widow  successively  of  Beau- 
champ,  Earl  of  Abergavenny,  and  of  another.  Earl  of 
Warwick,  of  date  early  fifteenth  century.  The  shroud 
was  perfect,  one  hand  and  arm  protruding  through  it. 
The  body,  too,  was  apparently  complete,  and  through 


TEWKESBURY  13 

an  opening    in   the   graveclothes   above  the  face  an 
abundance  of  auburn  hair  was  plainly  visible. 

Nearly   all    the   monastic   buildings,    including   the 
church,   were  condemned  to  destruction  as   "  super- 
fluous "    at   the   Dissolution,   by  the  king's  commis- 
sioners.    In  other  words,  His  Majesty,  besides  seizing 
the   ample   revenues,   proceeded   to   realize   for  cash 
on    the   building,    stone    and    lead.     The    townsfolk, 
on  urgent    petition,  were  graciously  allowed   to   put 
their    hands    in    their    pockets    and    pay    what    was 
practically  blackmail  to  the  amount  of  £550,  equal 
to  ten  times  that   sum  nowadays,  for  the  salvation 
of  their  glorious  church.     This  noble  building  is  for- 
tunate, too,  in  the  minor  matter  of  its  approach  and 
immediate  environment.     A  screen  of  tall  limes  and  a 
large  umbrageous  and  well-ordered  graveyard  divides 
its    northern    front    from    the    wide    termination    of 
the  quiet  street,  which  last  again  is  dominated  by  the 
beautiful  half-timbered  hostelry  of  the  "Bell  Inn",  with 
the  old  monastic  mill  spanning  the  stream  in  the  back- 
ground.     The  abbey  church  is  a  cruciform  building 
with  a  total  length   of  about   300   feet.     The  nave, 
which  extends  over  the  greater  half  of  this  and  ter- 
minates at  the  west  end  in  two  pinnacles,  together 
with  the  fine,  profusely  arcaded,  Norman  tower  are 
at   the   first   glance   the   most    dominant    features   of 
the  fabric,   and   in  distant   views   of  the   abbey  are 
singularly  effective.     On  moving  round  to  the  west 
end,   however,   you  are  confronted  with  what  is  re- 
garded as  the  finest  west  front  in  England,  an  immense 
arch  over  60  feet  high,   recessed  with  no-  less  than 
seven  circular  shafts.     The  space  has  been  filled  at  a 
later  date  by  the  immense  perpendicular  window,  some 
40  feet  in  height,  which  we  now  see.     The  aisles  of 
the  nave  have  lean-to  roofs  and  are  of  Early  English 


14  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

style  with  pointed  windows,  while  a  plain,  massive 
two-storied  north  porch  of  the  same  date  forms 
the  main  entrance.  The  transepts  are  short,  while 
the  extension  of  the  east  end  beyond  the  tower  main- 
tains the  elevation  of  the  nave,  but  with  later  and 
more  decorative  work,  and  is  surrounded  by  a  suc- 
cession of  partly  detached  chapels  in  curious  and 
picturesque  grouping.  The  tower,  the  battlements  of 
which  are  the  only  modern  additions,  had  once  a 
wooden  spire,  which  crashed  down  during  service  on 
Easter  Day,  1559,  a  catastrophe  which  in  more  or 
less  similar  form  was  of  the  commonest  occurrence  in 
the  Middle  Ages  and  Tudor  period.  One  is  accustomed 
to  regard  the  workmanship  of  these  old  monks  and 
their  masons  with  unqualified  admiration.  But,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  towers  and  steeples  toppled  about  in 
their  day  and  afterwards  like  very  ninepins.  It  is 
difficult  to  recall  a  cathedral  or  church  of  note  that 
was  not  at  one  time  or  another  shattered  in  part  or 
grievously  injured  by  the  unexpected  collapse  of  some 
conspicuous  portion,  and  it  is  difficult  to  reconcile 
the  skill,  devotion,  care,  and  time  lavished  on  sacred 
buildings  with  these  constant  structural  failures. 

The  interior  of  the  nave  presents  a  splendid  vista 
of  massive  cylindrical  Norman  pillars  connected  by 
semicircular  arches,  carrying  a  triforium  and  clerestory 
with  small  windows.  The  roof  is  groined,  the  ribs 
supporting  it  springing  from  sculptured  heads  on  the 
capitals  of  the  pillars,  while  the  bosses  at  the  inter- 
section are  carved  figures  of  considerable  repute 
among  ecclesiologists.  The  nave  aisles  are  at  a  much 
lower  elevation,  but  have  also  groined  roofs  with  some 
good  bosses  and  are  lighted  by  handsome  pointed 
windows.  At  the  east  end  of  either  aisle  are  monu- 
ments, dubiously  said  to  commemorate  notables  who 


TEWKESBURY  15 

fell  in  the  bloody  battle  which  here  terminated  the 
Wars  of  the  Roses  and  of  which  I  must  speak  later. 

The  choir  is  a  blend  of  styles,  owing  to  a  good  deal 
of  early  alteration.  The  old  Norman  pillars  have  been 
shortened  and  support  some  beautiful  arches  of  the 
decorated  period,  while  a  triforium  connected  with  the 
clerestory  continues  all  round.  The  fourteenth  century 
clerestory  windows  are  filled  with  stained  glass  depict- 
ing saints  and  benefactors.  Restoration  has  been  busy 
here,  and  there  is  much  blending  of  the  old  and 
new.  Here  again  is  a  rich  ceiling  and  more  orna- 
mented bosses.  The  floor  of  the  choir  has  been  laid 
with  tiles,  in  part,  old  ones  unearthed  at  the  Restora- 
tion and  filled  in  with  well-executed  replicas,  mostly 
heraldic  and  rightly  suggestive  of  the  great  houses 
whose  dead  lie  below.  The  same  plan  has  been  well 
carried  out  in  preserving  the  names  of  those  whose 
remains  were  identified  during  the  recent  investiga- 
tions. The  spot  beneath  the  tower,  for  instance,  where 
the  young  Prince  Edward  of  Wales,  slain  at  the  battle 
of  1471,  is  traditionally  held  to  have  been  buried,  is 
marked  by  an  inscribed  brass.  Both  north  and  south 
transept  too,  which  branch  from  the  tower  space,  are 
full  of  interest.  The  former  is  nearly  filled  by  the 
organ,  but  abutting  on  the  east  is  a  thirteenth 
century  chapel,  which,  during  the  long  period  of 
neglect,  was  used  as  a  school  and  miscalled  the  chapter- 
house. Restoration  has  here  worked  wonders,  not 
merely  in  the  literal  sense  of  the  term,  but  by  the 
beautiful  and  hitherto  obscured  work  it  brought  to 
light.  Conjecture,  in  default  of  better  evidence,  holds 
this  to  have  been  a  lady  chapel  for  the  use  of  the 
laity.  It  contains  fine  clustered  pillars  of  free  stone 
and  Purbeck  marble,  and  still  shows  a  good  deal  of 
the  original  arcading  that  went  round  the  building. 


1 6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

besides  much  detail,  which  to  catalogue  on  these  pages 
would  be  senseless.  An  ambulatory  runs  round  the 
choir,  out  of  which  open  the  various  chapels,  those  of 
St.  Margaret,  St.  Edmund,  St.  Faith,  and  the  tra- 
ditional grave  of  Brihtric,  King  of  the  West  Saxons  ; 
that  of  the  abbot,  indicated  by  his  altar  tomb,  and  an 
adjoining  one  that  serves  now,  as  it  did  in  ancient 
times,  for  a  clergy  vestry.  Among  other  relics  in  it 
are  some  remains  of  old  swords  from  the  field  of 
Tewkesbury,  while  a  room  above,  reached  by  a  spiral 
staircase,  is  known  as  the  monk's  chamber.  The  lady 
chapel  at  the  extreme  east  end  has  vanished,  nor  must 
I  linger  over  the  tombs  and  stone  coffins  of  known  and 
supposed  abbots  or  other  persons  which  rest  in  the 
ambulatory  of  the  choir. 

To  the  chantry  tomb  of  Fitzhamon  I  have  already 
alluded.  Standing  conspicuous  on  the  east  side 
below  the  altar  steps  it  has  a  beautiful  ceiling  of 
fan-work  tracery  and  much  floral  decoration,  A  brass 
depicting  the  great  Norman  was  extant  not  so  very 
long  ago  bearing  the  inscription  : 

"In  ista  capella  jacet  unus,  Robertus 
Filius  Hamonis  hujus  loci  Fundator." 

The  adjacent  Warwick  chantry  is  yet  more  elaborate 
and  of  the  florid  style  prevalent  in  the  time  of  Henry 
the  Sixth.  The  chapel  is  miscalled,  having  been 
actually  erected  by  Isobel  Despenser  in  1422  to  her 
first  husband  Richard  Beauchamp,  Earl  of  Aber- 
gavenny, who  fought  at  Agincourt.  An  inscription 
to  the  lady  herself  is  still  partly  legible,  above  the 
upper  band  of  the  screen,  and  forms  one  of  those 
links  with  a  remote  age  that  more  immediately  move 
the  historic  rather  than  the  architectural  emotions. 

On  the  north  side  too  of  the  altar  is  a  beautiful 
canopied  monument  of  the  Despensers,  representing 


TEWKESBURY  17 

Hugh  the  fifth  baron,  son  of  the  favourite  who  was  so 
barbarously  executed  at  Hereford,  in  company  with 
his  wife  Ehzabeth.     The  two   lie   here  in  alabaster, 
the   fourteenth   century   armour   of   the   knight   and 
costume   of   the   lady   being   beautifully   carved.     In 
the  south  transept  is  an  apsidal  Norman  chapel  with 
a  chamber  above  which  belongs  to  the  earlier  work 
of   the  abbey.     Between  this  transept  and  the  choir 
stands    the    much-treasured    old   organ,    which   was 
built  in  the  year  1637  for  Magdalene  College,  Oxford, 
removed  by  Cromwell  to  Hampton  Court,  where  Milton 
is  popularly  supposed  to  have  used  it,  sent  back  again 
at  the  Restoration  to  Magdalene,  and  finally  purchased 
by  Tewkesbury  in  1736.     Even  now  it  is  occasionally 
used,  but  has  been  subjected  at  various  times  to  a 
great  deal  of  renovation.     The  ancient  glass  of  the 
choir  windows  is  another  of  the  treasures  of  Tewkes- 
bury.    The  Despensers  of  the  fourteenth  century  are 
credited  both  with   the   stone-work    of    the   pointed 
windows  and  their  original  filling,  of  which  last  there 
are  considerable   remains.     The  glass,   however,   has 
been  much  knocked  about,  and  the  damage  not  over 
well  repaired.     But  even  still,  and  above  all,  from  the 
historical  point  of  view,  these  windows  are  of  great 
value.     How  indeed  could  they  be  otherwise  v/hen 
we  have  in  them  more  or  less  contemporary  portraits 
of  the  Clares,   Despensers,  and   others  of   the  great 
warriors  and  nobles  with  whom  the  fortunes  of  the 
abbey  were  identified  ;   mainly  valuable  of  course  for 
the    elaborate    armour    and    costumes    as    they    are 
here  depicted,  and  above  all  for  the  armorial  bearings 
which  so  materially  help  the  modern  student  to  an 
understanding  of  their  complicated  relationship.     The 
cloisters  have  gone,  but    the    old    gatehouse  of  the 
monastery    has    escaped    demolition.     Part    of    the 


1 8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

present  vicarage,  hard  by  the  church,  and  an  arched 
gateway  belong  to  the  original  fabric.  When  I  have 
stated  that  the  site  of  the  monastic  buildings,  with 
their  remains  outside  the  church  precincts,  were 
private  property  till  purchased  by  subscription  for 
;^i 0,000  about  twenty-five  years  ago,  I  leave  the 
subject,  with  that  vague  sense  of  some  apology  due  to 
the  reader  which  always  haunts  me  after  taking  him 
into  a  church  and  then  saying  what  is  very  likely  to 
be  either  too  much  or  too  little  for  him.  The  first,  to 
be  sure,  is  the  most  heinous  offence  of  the  two,  for  the 
other  can  be  amended  by  reference  to  one  of  those 
publications  whose  worthy  and  proper  function  it  is 
to  set  forth  in  detail  exteriors  and  interiors.  But 
I  know  the  type  of  man  exactly  who  will  not  tolerate 
such  shirking,  and  have  a  great  regard  and  respect  for 
him  as  an  enthusiast  and  a  staunch  supporter  of  the 
county  archaeological  society.  I  have  spent  many  a 
pleasant  hour  in  many  a  church  in  many  counties  with 
him,  but  he  has  the  vice  of  the  specialist  accustomed  to 
dealing  with  select  bodies  of  enthusiasts,  and  when  he 
confronts  an  unassorted  audience  he  is  apt  to  display 
a  somewhat  dimmed  sense  of  perspective  and  lack  of 
consideration  for  the  weak  members  among  them. 
To  be  more  precise,  he  would  have  me  take  no  heed 
of  them — and  in  consequence,  of  course,  none  for 
myself  or  my  publisher.  Now  a  writer  may  feel 
fairly  sanguine  of  retaining  both  the  company  and  the 
goodwill  of  his  reader  upon  a  mountain,  or  upon  a 
country  road,  but  a  church  interior  is  a  cruel  test. 
I  find  myself  ever  looking  anxiously  over  my  shoulder, 
as  it  were,  at  every  paragraph,  lest  I  should  behold 
no  one  left  but  the  censorious  archaeologist  making 
rigid  note  of  my  judicious  omissions,  and  urging  me 
forward  against  my  better  instincts  to  the  bitter  end. 


TEWKESBURY  19 

It  is  one  thing  to  admire  a  building  in  person,  with  or 
without  any  technical  equipment,  but  quite  another 
to  rejoice  greatly  in  the  printed  details  of  arch  and 
column,  of  vaulting  and  window  tracery,  of  capital 
or  corbel,  in  one  that  you  have  never  seen  and  may 
never  see  ;  and  can  these  be  made  animate  in  descrip- 
tion ?  Yet  what  literary  pilgrim  would  dare  to  pass 
by,  in  his  pages,  church  or  abbey  of  any  note  with 
the  remark  that  it  was  of  Norman  date  and  that  an 
excellent  guide  can  be  had  at  the  door  for  sixpence. 
Personally,  on  entering  the  precincts  with  my  reader, 
I  feel  almost  uncomfortable,  treading  fearfully,  as  it 
were,  between  the  Scylla  of  the  archcTologist  and  the 
Charybdis  of  the  layman.  The  former  of  course  could 
not  possibly  be  really  conciliated  between  the  covers 
of  a  book  that  anybody  else  would  read,  while  on  the 
latter's  account  I  feel  much  anxiety,  when  beguiled 
betimes  into  testing  his  patience.  There  are  people  of 
sensibility  who  feel  profoundly  the  influence  of  an 
historic  building,  but  could  scarcely  tell  Perpendicular 
from  Early  English  work,  just  as  there  are  some 
ecclesiologists  who  are  absolutely  dead  to  all  sense 
of  the  past  except  as  punctuated  by  architectural 
styles.  The  first  are  infinitely  more  capable  of 
bettering  their  point  of  view  or,  in  other  words,  of 
providing  themselves  with  a  sort  of  ground-work  from 
which  to  stimulate  their  imaginations,  and  that  too 
with  almost  ridiculous  ease.  I  do  not  think  anything 
is  more  profitable  within  limits  to  the  soberer  period  of 
life  than  a  grasp  of  the  elements  of  church  architecture, 
even  if  the  temperament  that  grafts  other  things  upon 
it  is  lacking.  The  village  church,  at  any  rate,  is 
nearly  always  there,  as  a  worthy  objective  point  in 
these  days  of  facile  movement.  Thither  the  motorist, 
the  cyclist,  or   the  now  more  rare  pedestrian,  drifts 


20    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

almost  whether  he  likes  it  or  not.  It  has  been  given 
me  to  be  a  witness  perhaps,  in  a  far  more  than  common 
degree,  of  the  attitude  of  the  modern  pilgrim  as  he 
wanders  round  the  aisles  of  our  English  churches  of  all 
kinds,  and  it  is  in  truth  an  instructive  object  lesson. 
The  real  pleasure  that  some  obviously  therein  gather, 
contrasts  quite  curiously  with  the  hopeless  futility  and 
manifest  anxiety  to  get  through  with  it  and  away  that 
possesses  others,  as  they  moodily  peruse  an  inscribed 
marble  tablet  to  a  recently  deceased  churchwarden. 
Dear  reader,  or  at  least  dear  fellow-rambler,  if  you 
are  still  unconverted,  and  still  flinch  from  the  techni- 
calities of  ecclesiastical  architecture,  brace  yourself 
to  make  the  trifling  investment  of  time  over  its 
elements.  It  will  pay  you  enormous  interest  for  an 
extremely  small  outlay,  awaken  curiosity,  perchance, 
on  other  things  associated  with  it  and  stand  nobly  by 
you  in  your  walks  abroad. 

A  good  deal  of  fighting  has  been  done  at  Tewkesbury, 
but  that  single  May  Day  of  1471,  when  Edward  the 
Fourth  gained  his  crowning  victory  over  the  Lancas- 
trians, easily  eclipses  in  importance  and  bloodshed  all 
the  skirmishes  combined  that  took  place  here  during 
the  last  Civil  War.  The  battle  of  Barnet  had  been 
fought  in  the  preceding  month,  Warwick  the  king- 
maker killed,  and  the  shortlived  reinstatement  of 
Henry  the  Sixth  brought  to  a  violent  end.  Queen 
Margaret  and  Prince  Edward,  hastening  from  France, 
had  failed,  it  may  be  remembered,  to  make  the  English 
coast  till  the  very  day  of  the  battle.  But  the  Duke 
of  Somerset  and  other  Lancastrians  who  had  escaped 
in  safety  from  the  Hertfordshire  field  decided  to  take 
advantage  of  their  presence  and  make  one  effort  to 
relieve  the  fortunes  of  their  cause.  Margaret,  some- 
what against  her  will,  was  persuaded  to  the  endeavour, 


TEWKESBURY  21 

and  Exeter  appointed  as  the  rendezvous  for  all  those 
prepared  to  support  her  in  the  enterprise.  Only  a 
moderate  force,  however,  was  raised  in  the  west,  and 
when  King  Edward  marched  to  oppose  them,  the 
Lancastrian  army  having  reached  the  Severn  valley 
and  met  with  several  disappointments,  had  decided  to 
head  for  the  north,  picking  up  Jasper  Tudor  and  a 
Welsh  force  on  the  way.  But  Edward's  promptness, 
added  to  bad  roads  and  floods,  forced  Somerset  and 
the  queen  to  stand  and  fight  at  Tewkesbury.  The 
battlefield  lay  in  the  meadows,  through  which  the 
main  road  to  Gloucester  now  runs,  about  a  mile  to 
the  south  of  and  a  little  higher  than  the  town.  A 
small  camp  of  doubtless  prehistoric  date,  and  now 
shaded  with  elms,  on  the  left  of  the  Gloucester  road, 
marks  the  spot  where  the  queen  and  prince  had 
their  quarters,  on  the  night  of  May  3rd,  and  is  still 
called  Queen  Margaret's  camp.  Around  them,  with 
their  backs  to  the  town  and  facing  the  south  towards 
Cheltenham,  through  which  Edward  marched,  lay  their 
army.  Here,  too,  Shakespeare  gives  us  that  picture 
of  the  impending  battle,  in  the  fifth  act  of  "  Henry 
the  Sixth",  and  of  the  brave  Queen  Margaret  addressing 
her  troops  in  rousing  lines.  The  Duke  of  Somerset 
and  his  brother  John  Beaufort  led  the  van.  Prince 
Edward  and  Lord  Wenlock  the  centre,  while  the  Earl 
of  Devon  had  command  of  the  rearguard.  With 
King  Edward  came  Clarence,  who  had  played  the 
Lancastrians  false  before  Barnet,  and  his  own  brother 
Richard,  still  almost  a  boy,  but  a  very  man  in  action, 
while  among  other  leaders  came  Lord  Hastings  and 
Thomas  Grey.  The  Lancastrians  seem  to  have 
entrenched  themselves,  and  the  Yorkists  opened 
battle  with  their  numerous  artillery,  which  was  posted 
on  a  slightly  higher  ridge  easily  recognized  now  from 


22    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUxNTRY 

Queen  Margaret's  camp  and  crossed  by  the  Gloucester 
road.  Jasper  Tudor  and  his  Welshmen  failed  to 
arrive  in  time. 

The  first  attack  was  made  by  Richard  upon  Somer- 
set's entrenched  force,  and  failing  to  break  its  protected 
front,  he  practised  the  old  ruse  of  feigned  flight,  which 
brought  the  incautious  defenders  into  the  open,  and, 
as  it  proved,  to  their  utter   discomfiture.     For   the 
greater  part  of  the  pursuers  were  attacked  in  turn  by 
the  pursued  and  driven  in  headlong  route  towards  the 
Severn   where,    in   a   field   still   called   the   "  bloody 
meadow  "  and  marked  by  a  row  of  willows,  they  were 
slaughtered  in  prodigious  numbers.     Somerset  himself, 
with  a  few  followers,  escaped  to  the  other  division 
of  the  army,  but  instead  of  lending  it  aid  and  encourage- 
ment, he  fell  publicly  foul  of  Lord  Wenlock,  its  com- 
mander, for  not  supporting  him,  with  great  fury  and 
ultimately  clave  his  skull.     This  deplorable  outburst 
was  not  calculated  to  put  heart  into  the  troops,  who 
were  at  the  same  moment  attacked  with  great  resolu- 
tion by  Edward  himself,  and,  to  shorten  the  story, 
the  entire  Lancastrian  army  was  after  a  brief  and 
partial  resistance  put  to  utter  rout.     Most   of  them 
made  for  the  town,   and  both  in  its  outskirts  ard 
streets    a    further    sanguinary    carnage    took    place. 
Somerset  himself,  with  many  other  men  of  rank,  fled 
to  the  abbey,  where  even  there  they  would  not  have 
escaped   the   immediate   vengeance   of   the   pursuing 
king  but  for  the  clergy,  who  threw  themselves  into 
the  breach  with  all  that  spiritual  artillery  which  the 
ancient  Church  had  at  its  command.     A  priest  bearing 
the  host  met  the  pursuers  at  the  entrance  and  ex- 
tracted from  the  king  a  solemn  promise  of  pardon  for 
all   who   sought   refuge   within   the   sacred   building. 
The  chroniclers  disagree  as  to  the  death  of  the  so- 


TEWKESBURY  23 

called  Prince  Edward  of  Wales,  some  affirming  that 
he  was  killed  in  fair  fight,  others  that  he  was  brutally 
murdered  in  cold  blood  afterwards  in  Tewkesbury. 

Holinshed  relates  that  proclamation  was  made  to 
the  effect  that  whosoever  should  bring  forth  the 
prince  dead  or  alive  should  have  an  annuity  of  £100 
for  life,  and  that  the  lad  himself,  if  living,  should 
be  spared.  Sir  Richard  Crofts,  who  was  in  some 
sort  the  boy's  guardian,  thereupon  produced  him,  "  a 
fair  and  well-proportioned  young  gentleman  whom, 
when  King  Edward  had  well  advised,  he  asked  him 
how  he  durst  so  presumptuously  enter  his  realm 
with  banner  displayed,  whereupon  the  prince  boldly 
answered,  saying,  '  To  recover  my  father's  kingdom 
and  heritage  from  his  grandfather  to  him,  and  from 
him  after  him  to  me  lineally  descended ',  at  which 
words  King  Edward  said  nothing,  but  with  his  hand 
thrust  him  from  him,  or  (as  some  say)  stroke  him  with 
his  gauntlet,  whom  directly  George,  Duke  of  Clarence, 
Richard,  Duke  of  Gloucester,  Thomas  Grey,  and  Wil- 
liam, Lord  Hastings,  that  stood  by,  cruelly  murdered, 
for  the  which  cruel  act  the  more  part  of  the  doers  in 
their  latter  days  drank  the  like  cup  by  the  righteous 
justice  and  due  punishment  of  God.  His  body  was 
homely  interred  in  the  church  of  the  monastery  of 
the  black  monks  of  Tewkesbury  ". 

After  the  battle  a  great  service  of  thanksgiving  was 
held  in  the  church.  The  next  day  was  a  Sunday,  and 
for  some  reason,  whether  or  no  induced  by  the  day, 
thoughts  of  vengeance  seem  to  have  been  in  abeyance. 
But  on  Monday  the  lust  of  blood  broke  out  afresh, 
the  town  was  ransacked  for  refugees  and  a  goodly 
crowd  of  them  brought  before  the  Duke  of  Gloucester 
as  Constable  of  England,  and  Mowbray,  Duke  of 
Norfolk,  as  Earl  Marshal.    A  few  were  pardoned,  but 


24  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

a  long  list  sentenced  to  death,  including  Somerset, 
and  two  of  the  Courtneys.  A  scaffold  was  erected, 
and  on  Tuesday  the  heads  of  the  victims  were  struck 
off,  after  which  Edward  marched  to  Worcester. 

Queen  Margaret  had  so  far  evaded  capture,  and  for 
some  three  days  she  lay  in  hiding  in  "  a  poor  religious 
place  ",  which  may  only  be  guessed  at.  No  royal 
woman  surely  ever  had  so  much  experience  as  Margaret 
of  Anjou  in  this  kind  of  thing,  as  witness  her  frequent 
adventures  alone  and  with  her  husband  in  North- 
umberland. She  was  eventually  caught,  however, 
and  held  as  a  prisoner  till  her  father  paid  the  large 
ransom  demanded,  and  she  retired  to  the  Continent 
to  end  in  no  long  time  her  stormy  life. 

Tewkesbury  possessed,  in  the  person  of  the  late  Mr. 
Thomas  Collins,  a  perhaps  unexampled  combination 
of  a  builder  by  trade  who  was  also  an  architect  and 
antiquary  of  enthusiasm,  taste,  and  learning.  The 
abbey  in  all  matters  of  recent  restoration  owes  a  great 
deal  to  this  gentleman,  and  the  town  almost  as  much. 
A  pride  in  the  preservation  of  its  many  beautiful  old 
houses  was  greatly  fostered  by  him,  and  much  of  the 
work  done  under  the  same  felicitous  auspices.  His 
own  late  residence  facing  the  Cross,  where  the  three 
streets  of  the  town  meet,  is  perhaps  the  finest  of  all 
these  half-timbered  houses.  Tradition  has  it  that  this 
was  in  ancient  times  the  court-house  of  the  town 
where  the  feudal  lords  of  Tewkesbury  abode  when  in 
residence,  and  that  from  its  windows  Edward  the 
Fourth  enjoyed  the  spectacle  of  the  executions  that 
followed  on  the  battle.  To  catalogue  these  old  houses 
here  would  be  superfluous,  particularly  as  they  demand 
no  quest,  for  almost  all  front  conspicuously  upon  the 
main  streets.  None  are  more  imposing  than  the  two 
old  hostelries,  the  "Bell"  and  the  "Black Bear", already 


TEWKESBURY  25 

alluded  to,  which  stand  at  the  opposite  entries  to  the 
town  from  Gloucester  and  Worcester  respectively, 
while  the  "  Wheatsheaf  Inn  "  in  the  High  Street,  and  an 
old,  lofty,  narrow-gabled  house,  with  its  projecting 
fourth  story  next  to  the  "  Swan  Hotel  ",  are  as  striking 
as  any.  But  in  addition  to  the  many  conspicuous  old 
and  partially  restored  timbered  dwellings,  which  make 
Tewkesbury  a  delight  to  the  passing  visitor,  a  great 
deal  of  old  interior,  as  in  other  such  places,  lurks  behind 
what  are  more  or  less  modern  fronts.  But  the  fact 
that  a  bowling-green  with  all  those  mellow  attributes 
of  exquisite  turf  and  embowering  foliage,  that  give 
many  such  places  a  flavour  of  their  own,  and  in  this 
case  embellished  further  with  some  topiary  work, 
exists  behind  the  "Bell  Hotel",  reminds  me  that  Tewkes- 
bury is  also  the  scene  of  a  Victorian  novel  of  repute. 
I  blush  to  say  that  I  could  never  grapple  joyfully  with 
"  John  Halifax,  Gentleman  ",  and  again  failed,  to  my 
shame,  no  doubt,  even  under  the  shadow  of  the 
fictitious  hero's  inspiring  presence  to  get  much  forward 
with  it.  That,  however,  is  no  doubt  my  loss,  and  it 
only  matters  here  that  Tewkesbury  sets  forth  "  John 
Halifax  "  as  one  of  its  assets  in  the  literature  with 
which  it  courts  the  visitor  and  seeks  to  stimulate  the 
stranger  already  within  its  gates.  The  connexion  is 
in  a  sense  fortuitous  ;  the  authoress  had,  I  think,  no 
immediate  association  with  the  town  and  was,  I 
believe,  very  little  there.  A  mural  monument,  how- 
ever, in  the  abbey  to  Mrs.  Craik,  placed  there  by  her 
admirers,  confers  upon  that  lady  an  enduring  citizen- 
ship, and  the  verger  tells  me  it  interests  visitors  much 
more  than  the  tomb  of  Fitzhamon,  which  is  quite 
characteristic  of  the  average  tourist.  One  cannot 
refrain,  since  it  is  ail  in  the  same  neighbourhood, 
comparing  the  local  atmosphere  of  "  John  Halifax  " 


26  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

and  those  of  another  gifted  authoress  of  the  same 
period  with  the  scene  of  so  many  of  her  books.  The 
middle-class  town  life  depicted  by  Mrs.  Henry  Wood 
in  her  Worcester  books  one  feels  to  be  without  inten- 
tion a  really  valuable  if  ingenuous  picture  of  a  cathedral 
town  atmosphere,  though  illustrated  mainly  through 
the  medium  of  babes  and  sucklings,  merely  because 
the  authoress  was  part  of  it,  and  vastly  different, 
of  course,  from  Trollope's  brilliant  handling  of  Salis- 
bury. I  admit  without  a  blush  that  in  years  quite 
mature  I  had  no  difficulty  whatever  in  getting  through 
the  "  Channings  "  and  "  Mrs.  Haliburton's  Troubles  ", 
and  what  is  more,  I  never  find  myself  even  to-day  in 
Worcester  streets  without  a  sympathetic  thought  for 
that  cruelly  harassed  lady,  though  most  of  the  har- 
rowing details  are  long  forgotten.  Nor  ever  pass  the 
boys  of  the  cathedral  school,  flocking  out  through 
the  Edgar  tower,  without  a  thought  for  that 
amiable  scapegrace  Roland  York,  or  the  quite  im- 
maculate Arthur  Channing.  I  do  not  know  whether 
there  is  a  memorial  to  Mrs.  Henry  Wood  in  Worcester 
Cathedral,  but  if  there  is  not  there  ought  to  be. 

I  have  spoken  of  the  old  abbey  mill  on  that  diverted 
channel  of  the  Avon  which  washes  the  back  of  the 
town,  and  from  whose  banks  the  latter  gives  such  a 
picturesque  display  of  irregular  gables  and  well- 
mellowed  red  walls.  Like  an  ancient  timepiece  with 
new  works  in  its  case  the  abbey  mill  and  even  its 
old  wheel  still  holds  with  the  past,  but  its  interior  has 
had  to  conform  to  the  pressure  of  modern  needs,  and 
help  to  maintain  the  reputation  of  Tewkesbury  for 
its  one  remaining  industry  of  milling.  Now  when 
the  floods  are  out,  a  vast  sheet  of  water  spreads 
from  this  town  edge  over  the  Ham,  that  wide  expanse 
of  meadow  land  which  fills  the  angle  of  Severn  and 


TEWKESBURY  27 

Avon.  One  January,  some  four  years  ago,  this  state 
of  things  was  in  progress,  and  the  river  which  rushes 
from  the  dam  underneath  the  mill  through  a  brick 
tunnel  into  a  surging  pool  below  had  risen  up  through 
the  flooring  and  covered  it  with  about  a  foot  of  water. 
It  was  in  this  situation  that  my  friend  the  miller 
became  himself  the  inadvertent  hero  of  a  performance, 
the  like  of  which,  considering  the  circumstances,  out- 
strips anything  of  the  kind  that  I  have  ever  come  across 
in  real  life  or  readable  fiction.  We  stood  over  what  is 
now  a  grating  in  the  office  floor,  but  was  then  an  un- 
protected aperture  some  three  feet  square  when  he 
first  told  me  the  story,  which  was  as  follows  : — 

It  was  on  a  dark  night,  and  as  I  have  said,  in  January, 
and  everything  was  under  water  but  the  handbridge 
connecting  the  mill  with  the  end  of  the  lane,  including 
the  floor  of  the  mill  and  this  adjoining  office  room. 
Beneath  the  latter  the  water  filled,  of  course,  the  whole 
void,  not  running  fast  as  usual,  but  pressed  up  by 
surrounding  floods   into   a   state   of   stagnation.     On 
this  occasion  the  cover  for  some  reason  was  drawn 
back  from  the  trap-door  !     It  was  about  seven  o'clock, 
the  men  had  gone  home,  and  my  friend,  having  stayed 
for  an  hour  or  so,  was  just  about  to  lock  up  and  depart 
when  he  remembered  something  left  behind  in  the 
office.     Knowing  the   room  so  intimately,  he  left  his 
lamp   behind   him   and    waded    knee-deep  or    there- 
abouts on  his  errand,  either  forgetting  the  trap  was 
open,  or  being  over-confident  as  to  his  bearings  in  the 
dark.     Down  he  went,  at  any  rate,  clean  through  it 
into  the  black  and  watery  abyss  below.     The  miller, 
as  a  miller  should  be  when  on  in  middle  age,  is  of 
generous  proportions,  and  as  we  stood  in  the  bright 
daylight  on  the  dry  floor  beside  the  comparatively 
small  aperture,  it  seemed  incredible  that  he  could 


28  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

have  popped  so  neatly  through  without  saving  him- 
self by  his  elbows  or  hands,  but  the  depth  of  water 
over  the  floor  no  doubt,  in  the  suddenness  of  the  drop, 
threw  them  up  as  he  went  down.  Any  way,  down  he 
went  into  as  hopeless  a  situation  as  black  nightmare 
ever  conceived.  As  a  young  man  he  had  possessed 
just  the  ordinary  capacity  for  swimming.  But  the 
plunge  was  one  such  as  in  thick  water  no  professor  of 
the  art  would  have  taken  upon  any  consideration 
upon  a  summer  noon.  The  flood,  as  I  said,  was  up  to 
and  above  the  floor,  and  there  was  not  a  particle  of 
current  under  these  conditions  to  wash  a  swimmer 
down  to  the  only  aperture  into  the  millpool  some 
20  feet  away.  By  a  miracle  of  good  luck,  helped, 
as  he  thinks,  by  a  recollection  of  how  he  was  facing  as 
he  went  down,  he  struck  out  under  water  in  the  right 
direction,  and  finally  emerged  into  the  millpool  below 
the  tunnel,  there  rising  of  course  to  the  surface  in  a 
properly  breathless  condition  in  the  blackness  of  the 
night.  The  millpool  was  now  of  course  but  part  of  a 
waste  of  waters,  and  my  friend  in  all  his  heavy  winter 
garments.  A  high  brick  embankment,  however,  runs 
out  from  the  mill,  and  that  a  part  of  this  was  above 
water  the  struggling  miller  was  aware.  A  portly, 
buoyant  sort  of  man  of  strong  nerve,  even  if  he  has 
not  been  in  the  water  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  has 
perhaps  some  advantage  over  a  lean  and  neurotic 
person  of  greater  activity  under  such  abnormal  con- 
ditions. Any  way,  my  friend  hit  off  the  parapet  which, 
being  only  just  above  the  surface,  was  readily  accessible. 
Once  there  he  was  safe,  and  for  the  moment  the  humour 
of  the  thing  struck  him  much  more  forcibly  than  the 
horror  of  it,  and  his  heart  being  sound,  and  his  bones 
well  covered,  and  his  nerves  strong,  his  first  impulse 
was  to  laugh  loudly.     His  wife  has  described  to  me 


TEWKESBURY  29 

more  than  once  his  arrival  at  home,  and  I  do  not 
fancy  she  laughed  when  she  took  in  the  situation, 
cheerful  soul  though  she  is.  Probably  even  in  the 
stout-nerved  hero  of  this  prodigious  exploit  there 
were  moments  of  reaction.  For  myself,  knowing  the 
geography  of  that  gruesome  Stygian  route  that  mine 
host  had  followed  so  recently,  in  comfortable,  warm- 
clad,  portly  middle  age  on  a  winter's  eve,  I  admit  that 
I  never  woke  in  the  night  to  hear  the  gentle  summer 
murmurings  of  the  Avon  babbling  from  the  mill  for 
a  long  time,  but  I  tliought  of  it,  and  in  thinking 
shuddered. 

But  the  most  effective  bit  of  the  Avon,  in  its  associa- 
tion with  Tewkesbury,  beyond  doubt  is  the  old  brick 
bridge  beneath  which  it  enters  the  town,  before 
parting  its  streams :  the  one  to  receive  boats  and 
barges  from  the  Severn,  the  other  to  turn  its  two 
mills,  for  besides  that  of  the  abbey  there  is  a  large 
modern  one  with  no  (laim  whatever  to  the  pictur- 
esque. Here  above  the  old  red  bridge  are  boat- 
houses  with  pleasant  suggestive  surroundings,  while 
below  it  the  old  hostelry  c^f  the  "Bear  and  Ragged  Staff " 
of  Warwick,  though  the  second  appanage  has  dropped 
out,  displays  itself  in  harmonious  company.  From  here 
in  the  summer  months  you  may  embark  on  most 
days  upon  a  small  steamer  for  Worcester,  or  Bewdley, 
or  Gloucester,  or  other  Severn  towns  and  plough  the 
sombre,  little-travelled  waters  of  that  majestic  river,  or 
travel  up  the  Avon  slowly  through  locks  and  more  im- 
mediately attractive  surroundings  to  Pershore  and 
Evesham.  Here  the  Cheltenham  College  boys,  delivered 
by  special  trains,  may  be  seen  embarking  in  their  out- 
rigged  fours  and  eights  for  practice  on  the  Severn, 
and  all  sorts  of  holiday  people  being  launched  in 
craft  of  a  more  domestic  pattern  for  gentler  pilgrimage 


30  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

on  the  narrower  but   more   engaging  waters  of  the 
Avon. 

Scarcely  anybody  indeed  goes  boating  on  the  Severn 
except  in  racing  fours  and  eights,  for  which  its  broad, 
deep,  and  leisurely  current  offers  a  course  that  Oxford 
or  Cambridge  might  well  envy.  For  Sabrina  is  a 
strange  river.  After  its  arrival  in  Worcestershire,  in 
the  neighbourhood  of  Bewdley,  it  may  be  said,  speak- 
ing broadly,  to  lose  that  flavour  of  a  salmon  river 
which  it  maintains  tolerably  well  throughout  Shrop- 
shire, and  to  cease  finally  from  troubling.  Hence- 
forward, with  the  assistance  of  a  weir  or  two  at  long 
intervals,  the  river  rolls  along  a  deep  and  voiceless 
flood.  The  waters  of  a  hundred  Welsh  mountain 
streams  are  at  length  bridled  and  hushed  into  a  wide 
brownish-hued  silent  flood  that  only  utters  a  gurgle 
here  and  there  at  the  base  of  its  high  banks  where 
some  tortured  willov/  trunk  bends  its  knees  into  the 
stream.  The  Severn  is  like  no  other  of  the  greater 
English  rivers,  with  which  as  the  greatest  of  all  one 
can  alone  compare  it.  I  know  it  from  source  to 
mouth,  but  it  is  rather  on  achieving  full  maturity, 
say  at  Arley,  thirty-five  miles  above  Tewkesbury, 
that  it  begins  to  develop  its  peculiar  character. 

Throughout  its  entire  course  it  has  much  more 
than  common  beauty  of  environment,  but  from 
Plinlimmon  to  Gloucester  it  always  just  fails  to  touch 
the  high  watermark  of  West  British  scenery.  With 
equal  advantages  of  birth,  as  one  may  fairly  say,  and 
greater  length  of  journey,  it  never  achieves  the  high 
distinction,  the  exquisite  beauty  which  marks  the 
best  of  the  Dee,  the  Wye,  or  the  Usk.  But  it  is  in  the 
last  forty  miles  or  so  above  Tewkesbury  that  it  takes 
on  that  peculiar  sombre  flavour  which  is  all  its  own. 
From  a  bordering  hilltop  or  even  from  the  high  arch 


TEWKESBURY  31 

of  a  bridge,  the  Severn  presents  many  a  beautiful 
vista  that  leaps  to  the  mind.  As  a  winding  trail  in 
the  meadows  amid  the  rich  fair  Worcestershire  scenery, 
and  between  hills  draped  in  woodland  or  bright  in 
spring  with  the  blossom  of  orchards,  it  is  always 
fair  and  often  beautiful.  But  the  big  stream  itself 
undoubtedly  lacks  endearing  qualities.  It  seems 
to  invite  no  familiarity  and  display  no  charm  of 
detail.  The  snug  village,  the  ancient  church  tower, 
the  Tudor  mansion,  the  timbered  park  which  abound 
along  its  course  are  with  rare  exceptions  thrust  back 
to  the  foot  or  the  brow  of  the  receding  hills,  while  the 
river  pursues  with  even  current  its  solitary  way  between 
high,  rather  monotonous  banks,  and  amid  far-spread- 
ing meadows  given  over  to  the  bullock  and  the  June 
haymaker.  Here  and  there,  where  a  bridge  spans  the 
river,  some  well-known  house  of  entertainment  caters 
for  the  day-tripper,  and  pleasure  boats  ply  over  a 
limited  distance.  But  these  sociable  interludes  are 
far  apart.  In  the  normal  reaches  of  the  Severn,  often 
among  quite  beautiful  scenery  and  on  a  perfect  stream 
qua  stream  for  such  purposes,  there  is  scarcely  a  sign 
that  either  local  or  stranger  ever  dips  an  oar  or  paddle 
in  its  waters.  The  sort  of  thing  you  see  everywhere 
on  the  Thames,  or  even  on  the  Wye,  a  troublesome 
river  for  the  pleasure  boat,  is  here  practically  unknown. 
Once  or  twice  a  day  a  small  steamer  dragging  a  long 
trail  of  barges  makes  a  prodigious  commotion  on  the 
placid  almost  gloomy  stream,  and  dashes  the  waters 
against  the  base  of  the  high  red  crumbling  banks. 
Once  or  twice  a  day,  too,  a  steamer  load  of  tourists, 
making  the  long,  slow  journe}.  from  Tewkesbury  to 
Worcester  or  beyond,  repeats  the  same  commotion. 
And  between  whiles  the  moor-hen  and  the  water-rat 
have   the    strange,    unsociable    river    to    themselves, 


32    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

sharing  it  betimes  with  some  sohtary  angler  who 
plants  himself  on  a  lower  ledge  of  the  rough  flood-torn 
bank,  and  watches  his  float  swimming  slowly  past  him 
till  the  moment  arrives  for  the  oft-repeated  process 
of  pitching  it  once  again  upstream. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  these  high  banks,  rising 
always  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  above  the  water  in 
normal  times,  that  give  the  Severn  much  of  its  moody 
character  amid  otherwise  fair  and  gracious  scenes. 
Indeed,  from  the  surface  of  the  stream  you  could  see 
uncommonly  little  for  much  of  the  way,  but  the 
passing  banks,  fringed  sometimes  with  stunted  and 
much-fretted  willows,  a  prospect  that  may  not  deter 
a  strenuous  undergraduate  four  from  pulling  down  from 
Bewdley  to  Gloucester,  but  is  an  effectual  discourage- 
ment to  the  oarsman  who  boats  with  his  wife  and 
family,  or  his  young  woman,  or  only  a  book  and  a 
pipe.  The  very  salmon  which,  of  course,  run  up  the 
Severn  as  they  run  up  the  Wye  and  Usk,  seem  affected 
by  its  character.  There  are  a  hundred  tumbling 
pools  in  Shropshire  where,  by  all  ordinary  rules,  they 
should  rise  to  the  fly,  and  all  through  Montgomery- 
shire the  Severn  is  a  clean  and  buoyant  salmon  river 
in  every  apparent  essential,  but  they  entirely  reject 
all  feathered  lures,  and  why  this  perverse  behaviour 
is  one  of  those  mysteries  with  which  the  king  of  fishes 
likes  to  bewilder  successive  generations  of  ichthyologists 
to  the  end  of  time.  What  you  can  see,  however, 
from  the  banks  of  Severn  and,  indeed,  of  Avon  also, 
and  that  too  with  unfailing  delight,  both  at  Tewkes- 
bury and  at  almost  any  point  up  the  valley  towards 
Worcester,  are  the  ever  dominant  Malvern  Hills. 
Most  of  us  who  have  any  sense  of  such  things  at  all 
have  a  pretty  true  instinct  when  the  British  hill 
becomes  a  mountain.     There  is,  of  course,  no  precise 


I 


TEWKESBURY  33 

line  of  division,  though  probably  the  neighbourhood 
of  2000  feet  roughly  marks  the  altitude  which  in  our 
British  atmosphere  and  environment  first  touches  one 
with  that  indefinable  uplifting  sense,  mingled  with  a 
certain  pleasurable  awe,  only  awakened  by  positive 
and  palpable  stature.  At  a  point  just  below  2000  feet, 
hills  have  always  seemed  to  me  to  pass  the  line  of 
mystery,  to  soar  out  of  contact  with  the  world  below, 
to  touch  an  upper  one  that  abides,  not  merely  in 
utter  loneliness,  but  on  intimate  terms  with  clouds 
and  storms  that  we  below  only  know  fitfully  when 
they  drive  us  before  them  into  the  vale  beneath. 
But  2000  feet,  though  it  satisfies  one  in  a  cognate 
sense,  does  not  by  any  means  of  necessity  make  a 
mountain,  and  though  unequalled  as  is  our  island 
climate  in  casting  a  glamour  over  hill  and  mountain, 
and  giving  all  the  dignity  to  3000  feet  of  thrice  that 
stature  and  more  garish  climes,  you  must  have  bold- 
ness and  symmetry  at  the  2000  feet  standard  to  suggest 
the  mountain.  It  never  occurs  to  one,  for  instance, 
to  call  Dartmoor,  the  Stretton  Hills,  Radnor  Forest, 
or  the  West  Yorkshire  moors,  mountains,  though  they 
all  of  them  touch  those  cognate  chords,  dimly  indicated 
above,  in  a  manner  that  the  Cotswolds,  just  above  us 
here,  or  the  Wiltshire  or  Sussex  downs  could  not  effect. 
On  the  other  hand  one  would  never  think  of  calling 
the  only  slightly  higher  range  of  the  Brecon  Beacons 
anything  else  but  mountains,  while  in  North  Wales 
and  the  Lake  districts  plenty  of  heights  of  but  little 
over  2000  feet  have  every  quality  of  a  mountain  and 
are  never  alluded  to  as  anything  else. 

The  Malvern  Hills  do  not  nearly  touch  this  border 

limit,  at  which  the  English  hill  and  mountain  vaguely 

meet,  for  the  Worcestershire  Beacon  is  under  1500  feet, 

an  altitude  that  nothing,  perhaps,  can  quite  make  a 

3 


34  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

mountain  of.  But  of  all  the  ranges  in  England  proper, 
south,  at  any  rate,  of  the  Peak  district,  this  chain 
of  little  peaks  is  by  far  the  most  imposing,  as  a  land- 
mark and  a  spectacle.  The  fact  that  it  springs  as  a 
narrow  spine  out  of  a  comparatively  level  country  is 
in  its  favour,  and  this,  added  to  its  bold,  cone-shaped 
summits,  conveys  the  impression,  more  or  less  marked, 
according  to  the  atmosphere,  of  a  true  range  of  moun- 
tains, almost  as  if  some  fragment  of  North  Wales  had 
wandered  incontinently  on  to  the  verge  of  the  Mid- 
lands :  while  geologists  add  to  the  interest  by  telling 
us  they  are  among  the  oldest  rocks  in  the  world. 
The  Malvern  Hills  dominate  the  valley  of  the  Severn 
from  Worcester  to  Tewkesbury  and  add  immense 
distinction  to  the  scenery.  The  Avon  valley,  too, 
through  all  its  lower  reaches,  from  many  points  shares 
the  privilege  of  witnessing  the  sunset  behind  these 
stately  hills,  and  nearly  the  whole  of  Worcestershire 
lies  subject  to  their  influence.  Wander  where  you  will 
among  the  gentle  and  uneventful  midland  foregrounds 
of  Hither-Severn,  Worcestershire,  this  exotic-looking 
fragment  of  some  other  region,  this  inimitable  make- 
believe  of  a  mountain  range  springs  as  an  ever-recurring 
surprise  and  at  ever-shifting  angles  in  the  west. 

It  is  of  no  consequence  whatever  that  these  sublime 
qualities  do  and  must  greatly  evaporate  as  you  draw 
close  to  the  foot  of  the  hills  themselves  and  put  your- 
self on  intimate  terms  with  their  grassy  slopes,  steep 
as  they  are,  and  their  by  no  means  rugged  crests. 
They  are  everything,  of  course,  that  one  expects  of 
so  lofty  and  sudden  an  outcrop,  while  the  view  from 
the  summit  is  perhaps  the  finest  and  most  significant 
in  all  England.  An  outlook  that  easily  takes  in  the 
Warwickshire  heart  of  England  and  the  mountain- 
ous heart  of  wild  Wales,  that  touches  the  fringe  of 


TEWKESBURY  3  5 

Merioneth  and  Carmarthen,  and  discloses  Exmoor 
with  all  the  interludes  that  these  limits  will 
suggest  to  the  man  of  reasonable  knowledge  of  his 
own  country,  does  not  invite  comparison  with  the 
many  "  finest  views  in  England  "  within  the  fifty 
miles  radius  of  London.  It  is  at  a  distance,  however, 
that  the  Malverns  produce  that  effect  which  makes 
them  unique  among  purely  English  hUls,  an  effect 
immensely  assisted  by  their  curious  misplacement,  if 
the  term  is  permissible.  Twenty  miles  to  the  west- 
ward, and  twenty  miles  is  a  long  way  in  this  little 
island,  the  most  opulent  country  in  the  world  for 
physical  and  climatic  contrasts,  they  would  fall  into 
place,  as  it  were,  and  be  overshadowed  and  lose 
half  their  distinction,  whereas  they  now  illuminate  a 
region  that  seems  to  produce  them  by  a  supernatural 
and  wholly  unexpected  effort,  and  they  make  the 
most  of  their  situation. 


CHAPTER   II 
UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON 

THERE  was  fighting  enough  and  to  spare  in  and 
about  Tewkesbury  during  the  Civil  War.  For 
though  never  seriously  garrisoned  nor  fortified,  it  was 
an  important  post,  being  taken  and  retaken  no  less 
than  ten  times  in  the  course  of  the  struggle.  Indeed 
we  are  here  in  a  country,  and  shall  remain  in  it  till 
nearly  the  end  of  this  volume,  that  may  fairly  be 
called  the  cockpit  of  the  war,  and  with  good  reason, 
for  Worcestershire  and  its  outskirts  was  of  vital 
import  to  the  king.  It  was  the  centre  of  a  region 
sufficiently  strong  in  Royalist  sympathies  to  enable 
the  king's  soldiers  to  hold  most  of  the  towns  for 
much  of  the  time.  Above  all,  it  lay  between  Oxford 
and  Wales,  the  land  of  Charles's  reinforcements  and 
supplies,  and  still  more  the  land  of  his  hopes.  It  lay 
also  on  the  road  between  Oxford  and  Ireland,  assist- 
ance from  which  last  distracted  country  we  all  know 
was  a  chronic  expectation.  So  attacks  on  the 
garrisons  of  the  Severn  valley  were  constant  :  the 
more  so  since  Gloucester,  being  early  captured  by  the 
Parliamentarians,  was  held  for  the  rest  of  the  war  by 
Massey,  one  of  their  most  active  generals. 

With  Gloucester  a  dozen  miles  down  the  Severn, 
and  Worcester  a  little  more  than  a  dozen  miles  up 
it,  and  a  constant  centre  of   Royalist   activity  and 

object  of  Parliamentary  attention,  Tewkesbury  and  the 

36 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  37 

lower  Avon  country  had  little  rest.  Essex,  with  an 
overpowering  army,  had  got  into  Worcestershire  at 
the  very  beginning  of  the  war,  while  the  Royalists  were 
gathering  their  strength  at  Shrewsbury,  and  to  the 
westward  of  it  for  that  great  forward  movement 
which  cleared  this  region  and  resulted  in  the  drawn 
battle  of  Edgehill,  the  first  great  engagement  of  the 
conflict.  At  Worcester  was  fought,  however,  the  first 
serious  skirmish  of  the  war,  which  had  an  effect  far 
beyond  its  actual  proportions.  At  Worcester  the 
last  royal  garrison,  after  a  protracted  siege,  capitu- 
lated, and  finally  was  fought  at  Worcester  a  few 
years  later  in  165 1  that  sanguinary  engagement  in 
which  Charles,  not  yet  "  the  Second  ",  made  his  spirited 
bid  for  his  father's  crown.  That  skirmish  alluded  to 
above  took  place  at  Powick  Bridge  on  the  Teme,  near 
its  junction  with  the  Severn  on  the  Tewkesbury  side 
of  Worcester,  and  was  the  first  taste  of  Rupert's 
qualities,  and  those  of  the  then  fresh  and  well-mounted 
cavalier  nobles  and  gentry,  given  to  the  untutored  raw 
troopers  of  the  Parliament's  earliest  levies.  The  over- 
whelming personal  superiority  of  these  high-couraged 
trained  horsemen  and  swordsmen  to  the  hapless 
troopers  of  Essex,  with  the  death  and  terror  they 
dealt  out,  inspired  dismay,  says  Clarendon,  among 
the  active  supporters  of  the  Parliament.  The 
accounts  of  their  punishment,  spread  by  the  fugitives 
from  Powick  field,  who  never  stopped  riding  till  they 
got  to  the  Avon,  and  some  of  them  till  they  reached 
their  own  homes,  created  the  worst  effect  through  the 
army,  and  yet  more  in  the  busy  recruiting  districts. 
The  invincible  nature  of  Rupert's  cavalry  became 
noised  about  London,  and  the  recruiting  Serjeants 
found  their  difficulties  doubled.  Many  a  man,  too, 
says  Clarendon,  intimidated  by  these  reports,  left  the 


38    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

army  never  to  be  seen  again.  Powick,  however, 
whose  twice  blood-stained  bridge,  for  it  played  a 
great  part  in  the  last  battle  of  Worcester,  still  survives, 
is  hardly  within  the  Tewkesbury  district,  but  Upton- 
on-Severn  lies  quite  handy  to  it  on  the  north.  It  is 
scarcely  in  itself  worth  a  visit,  but  to  the  curious  in 
Civil  War  history  or  to  any  who  have  a  fancy  for 
spots  where  heroic  deeds  were  done,  the  stagnant,  old- 
world,  decadent  little  town,  whose  east  end  just  peeps 
over  the  high  bank  of  Severn,  should  surely  give  them 
pause.  Such  an  effort  will  be  the  easier  as  the  little 
steamer  that  runs  on  most  summer  days  to  Worcester 
makes  its  first  stop  at  Upton,  where  a  later  bridge 
spans  the  Severn  in  the  place  of  the  one  that  was  the 
leading  scene  in  the  incident. 

For  it  was  on  the  day  before  the  last  and  final  battle 
of  Worcester,  and,  as  Cromwell's  army,  under  its 
great  chief  in  person,  was  advancing  on  the  city,  that 
Fleetwood,  commanding  the  left  wing,  was  ordered  to 
throw  an  advance  party  across  the  Severn  and  seize 
Upton,  which  was  held  by  an  outpost  from  Worcester 
of  three  hundred  Scots  under  the  brave  and  able 
turncoat,  Massey.  The  bridge  at  Upton  had  been 
partially  destroyed  by  the  Royalists,  but  a  single  plank 
had  been  inadvertently  left  across  the  gap  or  gaps 
between  the  piers,  poised  high  above  the  deep  and 
sullen  river,  Fleetwood  had  with  him,  however,  some 
of  the  best  troops  of  Cromwell's  now  matchless  Iron- 
sides. The  morning  was  still  dim,  and  Massey's  men, 
who  held  the  little  town,  might  not  be  over-watchful, 
as  they  had  removed  all  the  boats,  and  knew  nothing 
of  course  of  the  forgotten  planks.  Fleetwood  now 
ordered  forward  eighteen  picked  musketeers  to  make 
the  perilous  journey  over  the  narrow  foothold.  On 
reaching  the  farther  bank  this  small  company  were  to 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  39 

seize  the  churchyard  and  church,  and  hold  them 
against  the  Scots  till  the  general  could  get  a  further 
body  of  men  over  the  river  to  their  support.  Even 
these  veterans  demurred  at  the  giddy  prospect,  com- 
bined with  the  additional  one  of  being  also  shot  at  in 
transit.  It  was  the  tight-rope  part  of  the  enterprise, 
however,  not  the  desperate  venture  on  the  other  side, 
that  checked  these  brave,  leather-coated,  steel-capped, 
booted  men,  and  this  they  ultimately  solved  by 
straddling  across  one  after  the  other.  Reaching  the 
bank  without  alarming  the  enemy,  they  just  managed 
to  get  to  the  church  before  the  whole  garrison  was 
upon  them.  A  tremendous  and  protracted  struggle 
now  ensued,  and  that  too  amid  the  flames  of  the 
burning  church,  which  the  Scots  had  managed  to  set 
on  fire.  But  the  eighteen  "  Saints  of  the  Lord " 
repelled  every  effort  to  dislodge  them  till  a  regiment 
of  Fleetwood's  dragoons  swam  the  river,  seized  the 
bridge  end,  and  replaced  the  planks  which  the  Scots 
had,  naturally,  withdrawn.  Now,  of  course,  there  was 
force  enough  to  drive  the  enemy  out  of  the  town,  with 
considerable  loss,  and  the  further  wounding  of  Massey, 
who  was  captured  next  day  after  the  Worcester  fight, 
and  sent  to  the  Tower,  from  which  he  escaped  abroad. 
Temperaments  differ,  and  some  visitors  to  Upton 
will  no  doubt  be  more  entertained  by  the  reflection 
that  the  "  White  Lion  ",  the  principal  inn,  is  mentioned 
by  Fielding  in  "  Tom  Jones".  The  ecclesiologist  at  any 
rate  will  stand  aghast  and  perplexed  not  at  the  modern 
church,  if  he  gets  so  far,  but  the  preposterous  decaying 
hybrid  that  now  covers  the  site  of  the  heroism  of 
Fleetwood's  martial  saints.  For,  upon  the  top  of  the 
venerable  tower,  which,  shorn  of  its  original  spire, 
survives  from  the  ancient  church,  an  eighteenth 
century   carpenter   was   permitted    to   raise   in   cold 


40    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^  COUNTRY 

blood  a  monstrous  wooden  cupola  of  uncanny 
shape,  such  as  you  may  see  on  the  top  of  an  over- 
pretentious,  old-fashioned,  country  court-house  in 
America.  Several  generations  of  Uptonians,  too, 
must  have  regarded  this  thing  seated  on  the 
summit  of  their  Norman  tower  with  the  eye  of  toler- 
ance, possibly  even  of  admiration,  who  knows.  There 
is  certainly  nothing  like  it  elsewhere  in  England  on 
such  a  pedestal.  Still  more  curious  in  a  different  way 
is  the  big-windowed  and  be-galleried  Georgian  fabric 
united  to  this  outraged  tower.  But  more  curious 
than  all,  this  not  undignified  example  of  the  odd 
perverted  taste  of  its  day,  which,  as  the  life  of  churches 
go,  should  now  be  in  its  young  prime,  has  been  aban- 
doned to  the  bats  and  owls,  and  to  the  sole  gruesome 
function  of  harbouring  such  dead  bodies  as  are  picked 
out  of  the  Severn  till  the  coroner  or  their  friends  or 
the  parish  have  done  with  them.  I  could  not  gather 
why  so  roomy  if  slightly  eccentric  a  parish  church  on 
its  historic  site  in  the  queer  little  town  should  have 
been  thus  condemned — though  not,  I  fancy,  in  a 
structural  sense — in  mid-career,  and  a  new  one  of 
radiant  saffron  hue,  but  otherwise  uninspiring  and 
irreproachable,  erected  out  in  the  country.  Some 
leisurely  octogenarians  propped  up  against  the  bridge, 
who  had  perhaps  justly  earned  their  leisure  and  more 
than  the  half-crown  a  week  allowed  them  by  the  parish, 
poured  out  their  souls  to  me  on  the  subject  and 
revealed  some  unsuspected  sentiment.  Both  of  them, 
it  seems,  had  been  christened  and  both  of  them  married 
in  the  old  church,  and  it  was  obviously  a  grievance  that 
the  prospect  of  both  being  buried  from  it  had  been 
rudely  shattered.  But  I  gathered  that  these  veterans 
of  industry  were  the  humble  spokesmen  of  quite  a 
faction  who  resented  the  abandonment  of  the  church 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  41 

of  their  fathers,  cupola  and  all,  for  the  radiant 
geometrical  saffron  building  in  the  country.  It  could 
not  have  been  the  cupola  that  drove  the  more  fastidious 
and  influential  of  the  parish  to  this  radical  measure, 
which  otherwise  is  conceivable,  for  it  suggests  an  only 
too  great  facility  of  removal.  I  felt  so  strongly  on  the 
face  of  things  with  the  old  men,  and  indeed  had  wrought 
myself  up  to  quite  heated  partisanship  with  the  faction, 
that  by  their  shrugs  and  ponderous  innuendoes  I 
gathered  stood  by  the  old  church,  that  I  sought  out  a 
leading  tradesman,  in  a  condition  almost  bordering 
on  suppressed  indignation.  I  found  him  singularly 
eloquent  on  the  subject,  but  so  non-committal  that 
when  he  had  finished  I  knew  there  were  factions  and 
that  was  about  all.  For  myself  I  would  sooner  worship 
even  in  an  early  Georgian  church,  galleries,  and  all, 
with  those  mellow  associations  which  are  more  eloquent, 
to  be  sure,  beneath  pointed  arches,  but  nevertheless 
have  a  flavour  after  all  independent  of  styles,  than  in 
all  the  barren  architectural  splendours  of  yesterday 
which  have  justly  contributed  to  the  reputation  and 
fortunes  of  Sir  Timothy  Roodloft. 

The  late  Archbishop  Benson  has  some  entertaining 
recollections  of  this  now  abandoned  church  in  his 
youth.  The  vocal  music  was  absolutely  a  one-man 
performance,  in  the  person  of  an  autocratic  clerk,  a 
shoemaker,  who  wore  a  wig  and  large  horn  spectacles, 
a  black  suit  and  a  white  tie.  The  orchestra — flute, 
clarionet,  violin  and  'cello — were  in  the  gallery,  and  to 
their  strains  the  clerk  sang  a  strenuous  but  untuneful 
solo,  not  a  soul  in  the  church  venturing  to  accept  his 
invitation  and  sing  "  to  the  praise  and  glory  of  God  " 
either  psalm  or  hymn.  I  myself  sat  as  a  boy  for 
more  than  a  year  of  Sundays  in  an  Exmoor  church, 
where  a  matchless  clerk  sang  a  duet  with  a  young  son, 


42    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

while  a  second  one  accompanied  them  on  a  flute 
through  every  service  from  start  to  finish  to  a  dumb 
and  awestruck  congregation. 

My  conservative  friends  on  the  bridge,  however,  had 
other  and  more  practical  grievances  than  those 
associated  with  the  slighted  parish  church,  to  wit,  the 
disappearance  of  the  ancient  riverside  industry.  For 
as  we  talked,  the  end  of  the  bridge  swung  open,  and 
a  small  tug,  dragging  twelve  narrow  barges  neatly 
covered  with  tarpaulin,  came  puffing  through  and 
swept  along  at  seven  or  eight  miles  an  hour  towards 
Gloucester.  So  far  as  my  acquaintance  with  this 
stage  of  the  Severn  goes,  this  convoy  two  or  three 
times  a  day  represents  most  of  the  traffic.  The  old 
men,  however,  were  eloquent  of  times  past  when 
water  carriage  was  more  important,  and  every  craft 
had  to  get  itself  along  as  best  it  could,  and  was  much 
more  intimately  associated  during  its  leisurely  sociable 
progress  with  these  riverside  towns.  But  such  traffic 
as  they  could  remember  was  after  all  but  a  trifle  to 
what  the  Severn  must  have  seen  before  the  days  of 
canals.  In  Tudor  and  Stuart  times  and  for  long 
afterwards,  when  English  roads  were  unthinkable 
quagmires,  half  the  local  output  of  the  Midland  and 
the  Welsh  border  counties  came  down  the  Severn  to 
Bristol — timber,  coal,  iron,  and  all  kinds  of  manu- 
factured goods.  Bewdley,  now  a  singularly  curious 
and  picturesquely  moribund  collection  of  houses 
and  buildings,  that  tell  of  ancient  wealth  and  activity, 
had  a  monopoly  of  cap-making  and  supplied  not  only 
the  English  but  afterwards  the  Dutch  navy  with 
headgear.  The  "  Monmouth  cap  ",  one  may  remark 
in  passing,  was  not  then  made  at  Monmouth,  but 
at  Bewdley  on  Severn.  The  people  then  engaged 
in   transport   alone   were   a   racy   and   peculiar   folk, 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  43 

combative,  clannish,  and  numerous.  The  Severn  is 
now,  as  any  one  may  see,  a  sombre  and  lonely  river  ;  it 
must  once  have  been  a  cheerful  and  bristling  artery. 
Sic  transit  gloria  mundi. 

I  must  not  carry  the  reader  away  with  me  on  any 
of  those  pleasant  byways  which  intersect  that  delight- 
ful Trans-Severn  Arcady  which  lies  about  the  base 
and  to  the  southward  of  the  Malvern  range.  Any 
one  quartered  at  Tewkesbury  would  be  quite  sure  to 
find  his  way  to  some  of  the  old  churches  and  timbered 
manor  houses,  the  wide  commons  bright  with  gorse, 
the  lofty  hill-tops  draped  waist-deep  in  bracken, 
which  distinguish  an  unfamiliar  region  to  whose 
shy  charms  Gloucester,  Hereford,  and  Worcester  each 
contribute  an  outlying  fragment  of  their  pleasant 
territory. 

But  Deerhurst,  with  its  Saxon  church,  is  a  mere 
stroll  of  a  couple  of  miles  down  the  Severn,  and 
scarcely  that  from  the  Avon's  actual  mouth.  It  is, 
moreover,  a  place  of  occasional  pilgrimage  of  the  more 
serious  kind  from  Stratford-on-Avon  since  the  advent 
of  the  motor  car.  But  the  way  from  Tewkesbury  lies 
obviously  afoot  either  by  pleasant  upland  faintly 
traced  footpaths  over  pastures  and  by  lushwood 
edges  or,  as  I  have  hinted,  along  Severn's  equally 
sequestered  banks.  Indeed,  it  is  no  bad  sample,  this 
short  walk,  of  the  peculiar  atmosphere  and  qualities 
of  the  great  western  river,  now  a  trifle  larger  from 
its  late  absorption  of  the  more  cheerful  streams  of 
Avon.  It  comes  back  to  me  on  a  sunny  afternoon  in 
early  July  with  its  inscrutable  reddish-brown  deep- 
sunk  flood  amid  surroundings  that  were  otherwise 
altogether  gracious  and  even  stately.  Our  path  lay 
along  the  edge  of  ox  pastures  and  ample  hayfields, 
which  spread  to  the  rim  of  the  near  slopes,  where, 


44    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

just  out  of  reach  of  the  Severn's  intermittent  rages, 
civihzation  perched  secure.  Down  below  us,  some 
fifteen  or  twenty  feet,  for  it  was  the  dry  season,  and 
taking  its  hue  from  the  red  sandstone  nature  of  both 
banks  and  bed,  the  sullen  river  forged  quietly  but 
quickly  upon  its  seaward  way. 

The  trail  of  barges  may  already,  for  aught  I  know, 
have  passed  up,  and  nothing  else  was  likely  to  ruffle 
its  surface  but  a  ferry-boat  at  long  intervals,  where 
some  by-road  dips  into  the  water  and  out  of  it  at 
the  farther  side.  The  brimming  banks  of  Avon  are 
ablaze  with  wild  flowers  or  hedged  by  whispering 
reeds  ;  but  here  the  rage  of  the  floods  leaves  this  tall 
margin,  which  is  intermittently  lashed  by  them,  but  a 
rough  melancholy  slope  of  red  ridges  and  tangled  turf. 
In  the  meadows  above  there  was  life  and  movement, 
for  a  soft  wind  was  blowing,  and  rippling  in  fitful 
gusts  over  great  acreages  of  ripening  grass,  which 
bent  to  its  gusty  breath  as  the  surface  of  a  lake  curls 
with  passing  winds.  There  were  other  meadows,  too, 
already  cut  and  cheery  with  haymakers.  Deep-sunk 
water-dykes  ran  here  and  there  parallel  with  or  at 
right  angles  to  the  river,  and  immense  trees,  ash, 
elm,  and  even  oak,  that  had  waxed  mighty  in  the  fat 
rich  earth  and  ample  elbow  room,  threw  sombre 
shadows  over  the  clear,  shallow  water-courses,  and 
rustled  their  thousand  leaves  far  above  where  the 
breeze,  sweeping  up  these  sunny  levels  from  the  open 
distant  tideways,  smote  their  tops. 

Deerhurst  lies  just  upon  the  meadow's  fringe, 
barely  above  high  flood  mark  ;  the  church,  the  old 
priory  farm,  and  the  Saxon  chapel  fronting  the  Severn 
with  gently  swelling  upland,  over  which  a  shorter 
cut  leads  to  Tewkesbury,  rising  behind  them.  It  was 
a    flourishing    monastery   in    Saxon    times,    and   the 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  45 

pleasant  so-called  Saxon  church  was  a  part  of  it. 
This  qualifying  adjective  implies,  of  course,  neither 
scepticism  nor  disrespect  on  my  part,  but  merely  to 
mark,  for  the  reader  unversed  in  such  technicalities,  the 
fact  of  the  term  being  generally  applied  to  buildings 
with  any  pre-Norman  work  still  abiding  in  them. 
In  this  case  an  unusual  amount,  about  half  the  tower 
at  any  rate,  is  attributed  to  that  period,  and  also  the 
semicircular  arched  doorways  within  and  without  the 
body  of  the  church  respectively.  The  building  is 
otherwise  nearly  all  of  pointed  and  later  work  and 
rectangular  in  shape.  The  lines  and  proportions  of  the 
original  church  can  in  part  be  traced  by  the  experts 
who  have  worked  at  it,  but  this  will  not  interest  the 
reader.  A  small  circular  window,  a  narrow  round- 
headed  doorway  at  the  same  elevation,  and  a  double 
window  with  the  unusual  gable-tops,  all  in  the  inner 
wall  of  the  tower,  would,  however,  catch  the  eye  of 
any  one  standing  in  the  centre  aisle,  and  these  are 
probably  Saxon. 

I  was  just  wondering  in  futile  fashion  whether  they 
were  pre-Norman,  for  the  styles  though  curious  are  by 
no  means  conclusive,  when  a  motor  party  of  Americans 
from  Stratford  broke  on  my  meditations  and  pro- 
vided an  apt  illustration  of  how  misleading  is  the 
technically  used  term  of  "  Saxon  "  to  so  many  in- 
genuous souls  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.  These 
particular  ecclesiologists  were  in  a  hurry,  and  gave 
about  two  minutes  to  the  interior,  in  spite  of  their 
obvious  conviction  that  they  stood  in  a  complete 
specimen  of  a  place  of  worship  erected  in  or  about 
the  time  of  Alfred  the  Great.  The  graceful  pointed 
arches  of  the  nave  springing  from  clustered  piers, 
with  elaborately  floriated  capitals  of  the  fourteenth 
century,  had  apparently  for  them  no  significance  what- 


46  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

ever.  Though  appealed  to  on  some  small  matter, 
and  thus  given  a  graceful  opportunity,  I  had  not 
the  heart,  or  perhaps  the  courage,  to  interfere  with 
their  whole-hearted  acceptation  of  the  guide-book's 
phraseology.  For  I  could  see  plainly  that  they  were 
devoting  the  two  minutes  to  desperate  mental  efforts 
at  realizing  the  atmosphere  of  the  Heptarchy,  as 
illustrated  by  these  Gothic  arcades,  an  effort  which 
must  be  particularly  difficult  to  any  one  flung  here 
suddenly  out  of  South  Dakota,  as  the  visitors'  book 
proclaimed  were  these  ones.  But  a  kind  old  gentle- 
man had  quite  recently  driven  me  over  to  see  a  Saxon 
church  in  his  neighbourhood,  and  after  we  had  walked 
round  a  thirteenth  century  nave  and  a  perpendicular 
choir,  I  ventured  to  ask  his  guidance  to  the  Saxon 
work,  which  was  probably  the  base  of  the  tower  and 
a  segment  of  the  chancel  wall.  "  Saxon  work  ?  God 
bless  my  soul,  what  more  do  you  want,"  and  he  waved 
an  impatient  hand  down  the  interesting  little  early 
English  arcade  of  the  nave,  and  up  to  the  perpen- 
dicular choir  with  its  ample  and  ornate  east  window, 
and  of  course  there  was  nothing  more  to  be  said.  My 
friend  was  not  an  ecclesiologist,  but  was  other  things 
much  more  useful  as  well  as  a  local  patriot,  and 
proud  of  his  district. 

If  my  Americans  had  not  been  in  such  a  hurry, 
however,  they  would  have  seen  a  true  Saxon  buUding, 
complete  and  entire,  the  real  point  of  attraction,  after 
all,  at  Deerhurst  ;  for  the  remains  of  the  monastery 
embedded  in  the  adjoining  priory  farmhouse  are 
inconsiderable.  But  the  late  rector,  Mr.  Butter- 
worth,  who  was,  nay  is,  for  the  present  tense  is  happily 
here  applicable,  an  ardent  archteologist,  has  laid  all 
the  secrets  of  Deerhurst  bare  in  an  interesting  little 
brochure.     It  was  by  accident,  however,  I  think,  that 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  47 

he  discovered  the  precise  relic  which  we  may  now  see 
cleared  of  all  obstruction.     Now  it  came  about  that 
a  half-timbered  house  known  as  the  Abbot's  Court 
Farm,  a  hundred  yards  from  the  church,  was  in  1885 
being  turned  into  cottages.     The  rector  was  looking 
on  casually  at  the  work  one  day,  when  he  noticed  the 
great  thickness  of  the  walls,  and  on  a  portion  of  them, 
which  was  covered  on  the  outside  with  plaster,  he 
detected  the  faintest  trace  of  an  arch.     Mr.  Collins 
of  Tewkesbury,  already  spoken  of,  it  so  happened  was 
engaged  in  his  business  capacity  of  builder  in  this 
apparently  matter-of-fact  job.     Such  a  happy  com- 
bination of  talent  very  quickly  discovered  that  they 
were   on  something   exceptional,   and  in  due   course 
laid  open  a  perfect  little  Saxon  chapel  of  nave  and 
chancel,  divided  by  a  rude  round-headed  arch.     One's 
thoughts  fly  on  looking  at  it  to  the  much  larger  and 
more  famous  chapel   at   Bradford  in  Wiltshire,   dis- 
covered quite  as  fortuitously  and    in  this    case   also 
by  the  rector.     The  Bradford  chapel  has,  of  course, 
been    the    keystone    of    much    learned    discourse    on 
Saxon    ecclesiastical    architecture.     Since    the    best 
authorities.   Freeman   included,   attributed  it   to  the 
eighth  century,   the   verdict   has  been    reconsidered, 
and  accepted  opinion  has  quite  recently  moved  it  to 
the  end  of  the  tenth,  and  in  so  doing,  so  far  from 
bringing  it  under  the  Norman  influence,  which  would 
be   dull,    has,    on   the   contrary,    discovered   a   more 
elaborated    and    independent    Saxon    school    derived 
from  Germanic    sources,  and    found  actual    comfort, 
rather  than  disappointment,  for  once  in  a  way  in  a 
later  date.     But  this  tiny  chapel  at  Deerhurst  is,  in 
truth,  a  gem  of  its  kind,  if  such  rude  simphcity  may 
be  thus  defined.     It  has  one  feature,   at   any  rate, 
which  Bradford,  the  best  example  of  Saxon  work  in 


48    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

England,  is  without,  and  that  is  an  inscription  telling 
us  who  built  it,  and  leaving  no  doubt  at  all  as  to  its 
date.  Mr.  Butterworth  found  on  a  chimney-stack 
adjoining  the  chapel  some  Latin  lettering  which  he 
deciphered  and  translates  :  "  This  altar  was  dedicated 
in  honour  of  the  Holy  Trinity  ",  As  a  complement  to 
this  was  dug  up  close  by  in  1675,  when  the  existence 
of  the  chapel  was,  of  course,  unknown,  and  now  pre- 
served at  Oxford,  another  stone  which  in  English 
reads :  "  Earl  Odda  had  this  royal  hall  built  and 
dedicated  in  honour  of  the  Holy  Trinity  for  the  good 
of  the  soul  of  his  brother  Eldric  which  in  this  place 
quitted  the  body  ;  Bishop  Ealdred  dedicated  it  on  the 
12th  of  April  in  the  fourteenth  year  of  the  reign  of 
Edward,  King  of  England  ".  This  fixes  the  date  of 
the  chapel,  which,  by  the  way,  is  45  feet  in  length. 
It  contains  nave  and  chancel,  the  latter  entered  by 
a  narrow  aperture  with  one  of  those  round-headed 
arches,  carried  a  fraction  over  the  semicircle,  and 
verging  on  horseshoe  shape. 

The  Avon  lends  itself  to  the  milder  forms  of  boating 
more  admirably  than  almost  any  small  river  known 
to  me.  The  greater  part  of  the  water  for  the  forty 
miles  of  its  journey  between  Stratford  and  Tewkesbury 
is  excellent  for  such  a  purpose.  The  inevitable  lock, 
of  course,  has  to  be  encountered,  and  towards  Stratford 
there  are  some  natural  difficulties  that  though  not 
perhaps  insurmountable  would  deter  any  who  was  out 
to  enjoy  himself.  Indeed,  between  Tewkesbury  and 
Evesham,  some  twenty  odd  miles  by  water,  a  small 
passenger  steamer  runs  nearly  every  day  in  summer, 
causing  a  prodigious  commotion  in  the  little  stream. 
This  form  of  enterprise  is  stimulated  largely  from 
Birmingham,  whose  junketers,  with  the  railroad 
facilities  now  open  to  them,  come  in  shoals  to  disport 


I 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  49 

themselves  on  the  banks  of  the  Severn  and  upon 
Shakespeare's  classic  stream.  If  I  did  not  know  what 
a  strenuous  town  it  was,  I  should  have  been  led  to  the 
conclusion  that  Birmingham  had  a  holiday  every  day 
in  the  week.  That  its  workaday  folk  can  take  so 
many  and  in  such  smart  clothes,  too,  one  may,  I  hope, 
attribute  to  their  prosperity,  and  assuredly  they  are 
most  fortunate  in  having  such  ready  access  to  so 
pleasant  a  summer  land.  This  kind  of  thing  is,  of 
course,  a  recent  development  all  over  England.  In 
Northumberland  or  Yorkshire,  in  Sussex  or  Warwick- 
shire, alike,  a  dozen  or  twenty  years  ago,  the  suburbs 
of  the  city  for  normal  occasions,  and  the  seaside  for 
special  ones,  was  the  regular  course  of  procedure. 
Now  every  village  is  full  of  the  better  sort  of  citizen 
for  several  weeks  together,  while  the  day-tripper  has 
extended  his  operations  into  fields  once  remote. 

Those  of  us  who  have  special  opportunities  for  noting 
this  change  throughout  England,  and  all  railway 
officials,  know  well  that  holiday  traffic  and  holiday 
ways  have  been  absolutely  revolutionized.  At  this 
we  ought  surely  to  rejoice,  if  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  greatest  number  has  any  meaning.  The 
respectable  tradesman  and  his  family  bring  grist  to 
the  country  village,  in  which  for  a  month  or  so  they 
court  the  simple  life  and  find  new  interests  and  enjoy- 
ments in  saner  things  than  negro  minstrels  or  music 
much  inferior  to  that  they  hear  in  Birmingham  or 
Bristol.  As  to  the  merry  tripper  he  may  strike,  it 
is  true,  an  uproariously  discordant  note  amid  the 
rural  peace.  But  then,  once  dumped  by  train  or 
steamer  upon  his  particular  stamping-ground,  he 
usually  stays  there  or  thereabouts  till  picked  up 
again.  He  is  out  to  enjoy  himself,  not  for  pedestrian 
enterprises  nor  to  pursue  butterflies,  nor  hunt  wild 
4 


50    THE  AVOxN  AND  SHAKESPEARFS  COUNTRY  ' 

flowers.     There  are  other  sorts  of  trippers,  of  course, 
mild-mannered    folk    with    kodaks    and    fishing-rods, 
for  the  Avon  supplies  inexhaustible  accommodation 
for  the  sedentary  angler  and  lessons  in  patience  and 
hope  deferred,  unmatched,  I  should  say,  from  what  i 
I  have  seen,  by  any  stream  in  England.     But  this  is 
only  at   spots  here  and  there.     Along  the  pleasant 
and  picturesque  reaches  of  the  river,  up  which  you 
may  row  for  many  miles  without  a  lock  from  Tewkes-  J 
bury,  there  are  just  enough  craft  on  a  fine  afternoon  " 
to  put  a  finishing  touch  to  a  very  perfect  picture  of 
pastoral  peace  and  tranquil  beauty. 

Bredon  Hill,  a  great  solitary  outlier  of  the  Cotswolds, 
is  the  dominant  factor  in  the  lower  vale  of  Avon ; 
while  the  road  to  Evesham,  running  to  the  south  of 
the  hill,  gets  there  in  a  dozen  miles,  the  Avon  wriggles 
round  the  northern  side  of  it  and  covers  nearly  as 
much  again  in  its  journey  to  the  same  place.  Bredon 
Hill  is  nearly  a  thousand  feet  high  and  about  ten  miles 
in  circumference,  villages  clinging  to  its  skirts,  woods 
and  fields  climbing  nearly  to  its  summit.  It  practi- 
cally fills  the  valley  and  marks  the  lower  limit  of  the 
vale  of  Evesham.  In  the  ascent  of  the  river  from 
Tewkesbury  it  looms  ahead  of  you  and  forms  a  striking 
and  ever-growing  background  to  the  meanderings  of 
the  quiet  stream.  The  Avon,  as  I  have  said,  is  a 
brimming  little  river  and  a  quite  ideal  one  upon  which 
to  glide  with  leisurely  oar.  The  very  antithesis  of 
the  inhospitable,  sombre-looking  Severn,  it  is  the  most 
cheerful  and  friendly  of  streams.  It  puts  you  on 
terms  at  once  with  its  neighbourhood  and  hides 
nothing  from  you  that  is  worth  seeing  upon  its  banks. 
Thick  fringes  of  flag  reeds,  to  be  sure,  shiver  and 
rustle  for  short  stages  upon  either  hand,  but  form 
no  unwelcome  interlude  and  make  way  betimes  for 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  51 

serried  ranks  of  purple  willow  weed  or  "  coddled 
apples  ",  as  the  country  folk  quaintly  call  it,  and  then 
again  the  pollard  willow  comes  to  the  front  and  grips 
the  bank  with  binding  roots.  The  chub  rises  stealthily 
beneath  its  shade,  while  the  small  dace  makes  rings 
all  over  the  surface  of  the  stream.  The  birds  are  with 
us  too  ;  not  indeed  the  sand-piper  and  the  water- 
ousel  that  haunt  the  Severn's  western  tributaries, 
but  the  moor-hen  makes  merry  in  her  raucous  fashion 
in  the  heart  of  the  flags  whence  the  shy  reed  warblers 
pipe  at  evening,  or  with  luck  even  a  kingfisher  may 
perchance  be  flushed. 

The  Avon  is  an  eminently  sociable  river,  nor  in 
any  way  fearsome  in  the  matter  of  winter  floods, 
howsoever  inconveniently  it  may  spread  over  the 
bordering  meadows  in  a  rainy  season.  It  is  not,  like 
the  Severn,  at  the  mercy  of  remote  mountain  cataracts 
that  send  a  three  days'  rainfall  surging  down  upon 
an  unsuspecting  country  still  suffering  from  drought. 
It  laves  the  banks  of  country  villages,  the  lawns  of 
country  rectories,  and  still  turns  the  wheels  of  many 
an  ancient  grist  mill.  I  committed  myself  just  now, 
in  a  moment  of  inconsiderate  levity,  to  the  statement 
that  no  potential  readers  of  this  little  book  would  be 
likely  to  contemplate  a  month  in  Tewkesbury,  Possibly 
I  have  in  a  measure  wiped  out  the  recollection  of  the 
jaux  pas  and  made  some  amends  by  giving  only  a 
slight  indication  of  how  much  could  be  done  in  such  a 
month  by  any  one  reasonably  alive  to  the  placid  charms 
and  the  storied  past  of  rural  England.  This  Avon 
waterway  alone,  for  those  fond  of  boating  amid  engaging 
surroundings,  should  easily  and  delightfully  fill  any 
vacant  days,  or,  to  the  taste  of  some,  do  much  more  even 
than  that.  For  with  no  sort  of  pleasure  in  mechanically 
pulling  a  "  tub  " — using  the  term  in  its  strict  university 


52    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

sense — I  was  tempted  again  and  again  to  these  pleasant 
and  homely  reaches,  and  to  achieve  by  water  what  I 
also  achieved  by  road,  namely,  a  visit  to  some  of  the 
alluring  villages  that  lie  along  the  banks  of  the  stream. 

Twining  with  its  ferry,  the  first  break  in  the  meadows 
has  nothing  of  particular  historical  or  archaeological 
note.  But  a  church  and  a  rectory,  a  wood,  a  hostelry  of 
attractive  features,  and  a  time-honoured  ferry  all  com- 
bine to  make  a  satisfying  picture.  But  a  mile  upward, 
lying  snugly  above  the  river  bank,  with  Bredon  rising 
behind,  is  the  village  that  gave  that  massive  hill  its  name. 
The  approach  thither  on  the  river,  brimming  here  bank- 
high  and  forging  through  the  meadows  ahead  of  one, 
with  an  exposure  that  catches  and  reflects  the  passing 
humours  of  the  sky,  is  singularly  felicitous.  As  both 
sky  and  river  were  of  brilliant  blue  on  each  fortunate 
occasion  that  I  made  this  peaceful  pilgrimage,  the 
scene  abides  with  me  as  among  the  most  inspiring 
that  the  Avon  has  to  show. 

Perched  on  a  high  receding  ledge,  above  the  stream, 
the  spire  of  the  old  church,  shooting  far  above  the  tall 
foliage  which  gathers  around  the  rectory  and  manor 
house,  with  the  river  coiling  to  its  feet  and  the  hill  of 
Bredon  rising  at  its  back,  the  approaching  visitor  will 
doubtless  hold  that  the  spot  seems  made  to  be  the 
consummation  of  a  not  too  arduous  water  pilgrimage 
on  a  summer's  afternoon.  And  when  he  has  tied  his 
boat  to  the  branch  of  a  willow,  climbed  the  green 
pasture,  and  pursued  the  short,  leafy,  deep-sunk  lane 
to  the  high  terrace  upon  which  the  village  is  perched, 
there  is  ample  material  for  the  expenditure  of  a  pleasant 
hour,  besides  the  subsequent  and  inevitable  tea  at  the 
village  inn.  The  rectory,  with  its  grounds  dipping 
towards  the  river,  may  be  incidentally  noticed  as  one 
of   the   largest   in  England,  though  not   in   outward 


4r. 


2 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON        *  53 

appearance  nearly  so  attractive  as  that  statelier  one  of 
Fladbury,  in  a  similar  situation  higher  up  the  stream. 
Its  emoluments  in  former  days  made  it  one  of  those 
plums  of  the  church  whose  figures  read  like  a  fairy 
tale  in  these  degenerate  times,  when  the  stipend  of  the 
best-nurtured  and  educated  clergy  in  the  world  is  on 
all-fours  with  that  of  a  superior  butler.     From  times 

f  previous  to  the  Norman  Conquest  Bredon  was  an 
appanage  of  the  bishopric  of  Worcester,  whose 
occupant  had  a  park  and  residence  here  which  last 
stood  by  repute  on  the  site  of  the  present  rectory. 
The  church  and  village  lie  just  behind  in  addition  to 
an  ancient  tithe  barn  of  fourteenth  century  date,  of 
vast    proportions    and    in    excellent    condition.     The 

'  church  alone  would  fully  justify  the  expedition  from 
Tewkesbury,  if  such  pleasant  toil  needed  justification. 
The  fact  of  there  having  been  a  monastery  here  in 
Saxon  times,  and  in  later  ones  its  close  association  with 
the  bishops  of  Worcester,  lend  a  further  interest  to  the 
more  obvious  ones  of  the  fabric  itself.  This  includes 
an  embattled  tower  carrying  a  lofty  and  graceful  spire, 
a  vaulted  Norman  porch  with  a  parvise  above,  and  a 
Norman  nave  with  decorated  aisle  and  chancel.  There 
is  also  an  interesting  Early  English  chapel,  containing 
several  fine  monuments.  Upon  one  fashioned  in  black 
marble  cased  with  alabaster  and  profusely  decorated 
with  coloured  devices,  beneath  a  richly  ornamented 
canopy,  lie  the  recumbent  effigies  of  Giles  Reade  and 
his  lady,  the  feet  of  the  former  resting  upon  an  eagle 
with  expanded  wings.  Their  children  kneel  dutifully 
around  them,  while  a  helmet  hangs  above.  On  the 
chancel  steps  are  some  heraldic  tiles  given  to  the  church 
by  the  Mortimers  in  the  time  of  the  third  Edward.  Of 
most  human  interest,  perhaps,  is  a  black  marble  slab 
in  the  chancel  to  poor   Bishop   Prideaux,   who  was 


54    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

deposed  from  the  See  of  Worcester  by  the  Puritans, 
and  retired  here  to  eke  out  the  remainder  of  his  exist- 
ence on  the  princely  income  of  4s.  6d.  a  week.  His 
misfortunes  did  not  deprive  this  good  prelate  of  a 
sense  of  humour  which  had  possibly  not  served  his  turn 
too  well  with  the  Cromwellian  party  when  knocks  were 
more  common  than  jests.  For,  one  day,  when  hard 
put  to  it  for  a  meal,  he  was  walking  down  the  village 
street  to  sell  some  old  iron,  and  on  being  asked  how 
he  did  by  a  passing  acquaintance,  replied,  "  Never 
better  in  my  life,  only  I  have  too  great  a  stomach,  for 
I  have  eaten  the  little  plate  the  sequestrators  left  me. 
I  have  eaten  a  great  library  of  excellent  books.  I  have 
eaten  a  great  deal  of  linen,  much  of  my  brass,  some  of 
my  pewter,  and  now  I  am  become  an  ostrich  and  forced 
to  eat  my  iron,  and  what  will  come  next  I  know  not  ". 
That  there  were  people  even  in  Bredon  who  objected 
to  a  state  of  things  that  drove  out  bishops  and  put 
sectarians  into  parish  pulpits,  and  had  the  courage  of 
their  opinions,  is  well  illustrated  in  the  person  of  one 
Thomas  Gosling,  yeoman.  This  hardy  individual  put 
his  views  upon  the  induction  of  "  a  pious  and  godly 
minister  and  preacher  of  the  Word  of  God  "  into  verse, 
and  was  presented  by  the  jury  for  shouting  and  singing 
his  compositions  "  in  the  presence  and  hearing  of 
diverse  honest  people  of  the  Commonwealth  of  England  " : 

Here  comes  Mr.  Beeston, 
The  man  wee  nere  Wiston, 
As  high  as  the  pulpitt  top, 
And  to  his  disgrace 
With  his  impudent  face 
To  reap  another  man's  crop. 

This  was  in  1656.  Ten  years  later  the  shield  was 
reversed  and  we  read  of  Richard  Hunt  of  the  same 
parish  being  indicted  for  giving  utterance  during  his 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  55 

devotions  to  such  unorthodox  invocations  as  :  "  Doune 
with  this  King  of  Babylon,  this  Popery  and  the 
idolatrous  ways  as  is  now  sett  upp  and  that  they 
may  not  touch  the  anointed  ". 

These  same  Reades,  who  are  commemorated  in 
effigy  within  the  church,  were  lords  here  of  old,  and 
in  the  early  seventeenth  century  erected  an  alms- 
house in  the  village,  which  is  the  most  ornamental  of  a 
good  many  picturesque  old  buildings  of  a  humble  sort. 
But  we  are  here  in  a  land  where  almost  every  village 
abounds  in  such  ;  a  country  where  the  "  black  and 
white  "  or  half-timbered  style  is  more  persistent  than 
in  perhaps  any  part  of  the  west  midland  and  Border 
region  associated  with  it,  and  yet  more  are  confronted 
at  close  quarters  with  the  Cotswold  stone  and  style. 
It  is  no  slight  merit  for  a  single  valley  to  exhibit  in  great 
profusion  these  two  widely  differing  types  of  English 
rural  architecture,  types  that  may  fairly  be  said  to  have 
no  rivals  but  one  another.  And  I  use  the  term  valley 
here,  in  the  wider  sense,  for  this  whole  compact  region 
between  the  high  bank  of  the  Cotswolds  and  the 
rolling  plateau  of  Worcestershire.  The  Avon,  one 
might  fancy,  should  flow  by  rights  through  the  centre 
of  this  depression  from  Evesham  to  Tewkesbury, 
whereas  we  have  seen  that  it  wriggles  along  its 
north-westerly  edge  behind  Bredon  Hill  to  Pershore, 
adding  no  doubt  by  so  doing  a  good  deal  to  its  charm. 

A  couple  of  miles  or  so  up  the  river  and  upon  the 
farther  side,  in  a  situation  of  quite  remarkable  seclu- 
sion from  the  madding  crowd,  is  Strensham,  or  more 
properly  speaking  Lower  Strensham,  now,  however,  as 
lying  behind  a  high-wooded  bank,  very  obvious  from 
the  Avon.  This  Lower  Strensham  consists  of  a  rather 
remarkable  church,  a  vicarage,  and  a  mill.  For  my- 
self it  comes  back  to  me  a  great  deal  more  vividly 


56  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

from  the  landward  point  of  view,  very  much  the  best 
method  of  approaching  it  for  any  one  who  has  con- 
tracted a  prior  interestin  the  place,  since  its  associations, 
like  its  parish,  spread  themselves  over  a  considerable 
extent  of  country,  I  had  acquired  what  may  be  called 
a  conventional  interest  in  Strensham  church  as  enjoy- 
ing the  reputation  of  being  worth  inspection  and  of 
commemorating  Butler  the  author  of  "  Hudibras".  But 
a  more  personal  interest  urged  my  steps  hither,  in  that 
it  had  been  of  old  the  seat  of  the  great  Worcestershire 
house  of  Russell  now  long  extinct.  The  part  they 
played  in  the  Civil  War  on  the  king's  side  had  aroused 
within  me  a  strong  desire  merely  to  behold  the  fields 
that  bred  them,  and  the  site,  at  any  rate,  for  there  is 
nothing  more,  of  the  walls  that  sheltered  them  for 
centuries,  and  to  see,moreover,the  splendid  monuments 
and  brasses  which  in  this  small  out-of-the-way  parish 
are  the  sole  relics  of  this  once  illustrious  race.  So 
one  afternoon,  in  a  month  of  brilliant  July  days,  I 
took  the  Worcester  road  from  Tewkesbury,  which 
follows  the  ridge  above  the  Severn  valley,  and  mounted 
in  due  course  the  slope  leading  up  to  it,  where  stands  a 
modern  country  house  called  the  Mythe,  the  site  of 
which  seems  to  have  generated  a  wealth  of  legendary 
speculation  worthy  of  the  quite  fortuitous  name. 
A  little  later  I  passed  beneath  the  noble  avenue  that 
bisects  Brackeridge,  one  of  those  numerous  upland 
commons  in  which  Worcester  abounds.  I  had  taken 
of  design  a  somewhat  circuitous  route  and  found  myself 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  Upton  before  any  opportunity 
was  given  for  turning  west  toward  the  Avon  valley, 
which  for  a  long  way  runs  at  quite  an  acute  angle 
with  the  Severn.  It  so  happened  I  had  forgotten  my 
map,  not  a  serious  oversight  for  a  seven  or  eight  mile 
road  journey.     But  when  at  last  I  turned  from  the 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  57 

highway,  under  the  combined  influence  of  an  inconse- 
quent looking  finger-post  and  a  rustic  who  character- 
istically could  not  get  over  the  discovery  that  I  had 
deliberately  adopted  this  roundabout  route  to  Strens- 
ham,  and  became  in  consequence  both  curt  and 
incoherent,  I  found  myself  in  a  meandering  lane 
which  seemed  interminable.  In  course  of  time,  en- 
countering no  more  humanity,  I  was  greeted  by  the 
sight  of  an  extremely  disappointing  little  church  of 
a  painfully  youthful  exterior  seated  on  the  top  of  a 
bare  hill  above  the  road.  Still,  one  has  constantly 
encountered  churches  that  have  suffered  much  exter- 
nally from  the  restorer  and  yet  retain  within  all  the 
flavour  and  many  of  the  treasures  of  their  past.  At 
any  rate  the  monuments  and  the  brasses  of  the  Russells, 
I  felt  confident,  were  there  safe  enough.  Now  the 
most  seasoned  rambler  is  accustomed,  and  with  justice, 
to  assume  that  when  a  by-road  is  marked  by  a  post 
with  only  one  finger,  and  that  bearing  only  one  name, 
the  first  place  encountered  is  the  one  thus  indicated. 
A  modest  vicarage  lay  at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  at 
the  gate  of  which  I  came  upon  the  gardener,  who 
duly  informed  me  that  the  church  was  locked,  but 
that  the  key  was  in  the  house  and  very  much  at  my 
service.  I  noticed  something  in  his  manner  not  quite 
in  keeping  with  that  of  the  clerical  retainer  who  is 
concerned  with  the  keys  of  churches  which  strangers 
frequent,  and  wondered  afterwards  what  he  made  of 
me.  He  brought  out  the  keys,  however,  with  the 
significant  remark  that  the  vicar  was  in  the  house, 
which  I,  with  a  tolerably  protracted  experience  of  such 
interviews,  merely  interpreted  as  a  hint  that,  like  many 
intelligent  parsons,  he  was  not  averse  to  doing  the 
honours  of  his  church.  I  have  little  doubt  now, 
however,  that   the  faithful  retainer   must   have   had 


58  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

some  vague  suspicions  at  my  untoward  demand,  un- 
doubtedly the  first  in  his  experience.  The  suggestion 
suited  my  inclination  exactly.  But  before  reaching 
the  door  I  practically  ran  into  the  arms  of  the  vicar, 
writing  his  sermon,  I  presume,  for  it  was  Saturday, 
at  the  open  window.  He  was  polite  but  quite  excus- 
ably a  trifle  curt,  and  exhibited  no  sort  of  eagerness 
to  play  the  cicerone,  merely  remarking  that  William 
had  the  keys.  On  receiving  these  from  the  more 
curious  domestic,  the  possibility  of  having  been  fooled, 
and  not  for  the  first  time  by  a  finger-post,  flashed  upon 
me  and  prompted  the  belated  query,  "  I  suppose  this 
is  Strensham  ?  "    "  Strensham  ?     Lord,  no,  sir  ;  this 

is "     Well,  never  mind.     I  looked  it  up  later  in 

a  Worcestershire  guide-book,  whose  author,  an  ardent 
antiquary,  expends  a  great  deal  of  well-informed 
eloquence  on  churches.  He  dismisses  this  one  in 
three  words  as  a  "  very  simple  structure,"  which  it 
most  undoubtedly  looked. 

William,  however,  put  me  right  in  my  bearings,  and 
naturally  disclaimed  any  responsibility  for  the  sign- 
post, which  probably  never  led  or  misled  anybody 
before,  since  doubtless  only  natives  turn  down 
that  way,  hence  its  unworthy  survival.  The  topo- 
graphical situation  of  Strensham,  however,  as  repre- 
sented by  its  church,  was  beyond  the  powers  of 
William  ;  but  encouraged  by  wagoners  hauling  loads 
of  sweet,  well-curedhaytosomeneighbouringhomestead, 
I  ultimately  found  myself  pursuing  a  road  that  wandered 
through  many  fields  and  still  more  gates,  yet  proved 
nevertheless  to  be  the  route  taken  every  Sunday 
by  the  churchgoers  of  Strensham  village,  another 
thing  altogether.  On  subsequently  consulting  the 
map  I  found  consolation  in  the  fact  that  it  too  had 
apparently   abandoned   all   hope   and   recognition   of 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  59 

Strensham  church  and  its  wayward  approaches. 
Lower  Strensham  Castle,  however,  some  distance  away 
was  conspicuously  marked,  though  nothing  but  the 
moat  remains  of  the  fortress  which  John  Russell  got  a 
licence  to  crenellate  in  the  time  of  Richard  the  Second. 
The  wandering  track  at  length  ran  out  in  a  pasture 
field  where  Strensham  church  rose  before  me  in  all 
its  simplicity  and  seclusion.  The  vicarage  was  hidden 
just  below  it  on  a  wooded  slope  which  dipped,  one 
might  guess,  to  the  Avon,  and  the  vicar  kindly  placed 
himself  as  well  as  the  key  at  my  disposal.  There 
was  nothing  here  of  any  external  significance, 
as  at  Bredon  for  instance,  just  a  massive  tower, 
with  nave  and  chancel  of  the  Perpendicular  and 
Decorated  period  respectively,  but  inside  there  was 
much  to  interest.  The  Russell  brasses  of  the  fourteenth, 
fifteenth,  and  sixteenth  centuries,  with  effigies  upon 
thechancel  floor,  for  one  thing  are  among  the  best 
in  England.  There  is  a  fine  marble  tomb  bearing 
recumbent  effigies  of  Sir  Francis  Russell  and  his  wife, 
a  Lytton  of  Knebworth,  erected  about  1700,  and  two 
others  with  more  Russells  in  a  leaning  posture  of  a 
rather  later  date.  In  the  uncensorious  period  of  the 
last  century  when  vicars  and  rectors  all  over  England 
did  uncanny  or  eccentric  things,  and  provided  humorous 
material  for  another  generation  to  record  with  embellish- 
ments in  fat  volumes,  the  Vicar  of  Strensham  was  in 
no  way  behindhand.  Tucked  away  with  his  church 
at  the  remote  end  of  a  long  untra veiled  road,  and  with 
no  parochial  eye  on  or  near  him  but  that  of  the  miller, 
there  was  much  temptation  for  a  parson  of  original 
mind  and  egotistic  habit  to  fall  into  the  notion  that 
the  church  was  his  personal  property  in  fee-simple. 
I  think,  upon  the  whole,  that  this  particular  divine 
went  one  better  than  most  even  of  his  type  or  period. 


6o    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

For  he  tore  off  the  precious  brass  on  the  chancel  floor 
that  covered  the  tomb  of  one  of  the  most  illustrious 
of  the  Russells,  and  deposited  therein  the  body  of  his 
wife  and  then  his  father-in-law,  replacing  the  knightly 
efhgy  with  an  inscription  to  these  worthy  souls  and 
to  himself.  And  when  death  ended  his  reign  at  Strens- 
ham  he  had  himself  deposited  on  the  top  of  his  relations 
in  the  knightly  tomb,  which,  as  the  outrage  had  been 
already  committed,  did  not  greatly  signify.  He  also 
signalized  his  period  of  residence  by  flooring  the 
vicarage  pigsties  with  tombstones  from  the  church- 
yard. 

Most  of  the  church  is  thirteenth  century,  but  there  is 
a  barrel  roof  of  a  much  later  period,  and  what  is  really 
curious,  the  present  seating  of  panelled  box  pews 
dates  from  the  time  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  though  they 
have  been  painted  yellow.  A  gallery  at  the  west  end 
is  fashioned  from  the  materials  of  a  former  rood 
screen,  and  its  ancient  front  is  decorated  with  fresco 
panels  of  the  Tudor  period,  representing  saints, 
bishops,  and  apostles,  all  in  wonderful  preservation, 
Strensham,  as  noted,  is  the  birthplace  of  Samuel  Butler, 
of  "  Hudibras  "  renown,  and  there  is  a  monument  in 
the  church  to  that  worthy  and  caustic  soul,  though  his 
remains  lie  in  St.  Paul's,  Covent  Garden.  It  has  been 
mentioned  that  the  Russells  of  Strensham  suffered 
greatly  for  their  adherence  to  the  king's  side  in  the 
Civil  War.  At  the  surrender  of  Worcester  in  July  1646, 
after  a  desperate  resistance  of  some  two  months,  Sir 
William  Russell  was  the  only  officer  whom  the  victors 
excluded  from  the  terms  of  capitulation,  but  his 
companions  vowed  that  they  would  sooner  die  than 
purchase  their  own  lives  on  such  terms.  Sir  William, 
however,  hushed  all  protests  and  declared  that  as  he 
had  only  one  life  to  lose  he  could  not  lose  it  in  a  better 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  6i 

cause,  and  went  gaily  to  surrender  himself.  But 
nothing  worse  eventually  befell  him  than  an  excep- 
tionally severe  measure  of  sequestration.  Sir  William 
had  been  an  active  leader  in  and  about  Worcestershire 
throughout  the  war.  Strensham  Castle  itself  had  been 
a  fortified  post,  and  was  taken  once  by  the  Parlia- 
mentary forces,  who  were  as  strong  in  Warwickshire  as 
were  their  enemies  in  Worcestershire.  Nothing  is  left 
of  it  now  but  the  moat.  On  its  destruction  the  Russells 
built  a  mansion  in  another  part  of  the  parish,  which 
was  replaced  by  the  present  Strensham  Hall. 

Samuel  Butler's  father  was  a  yeoman  farmer  in 
Strensham  parish  with  a  ;£io-tenement  of  his  own, 
and  the  lease  of  a  farm  of  £300  a  year  under  Sir  William 
Russell.  The  boy  was  born  in  1612,  was  sent  to  the 
King's  School  at  Worcester,  and  is  thought  to  have 
proceeded  to  Cambridge  for  a  time,  but  at  any  rate 
he  entered  as  clerk  the  household  of  Thomas  Jefferies 
of  Earls  Croome  near  by,  an  active  Justice  of  the 
Peace.  Living  practically  as  one  of  the  family  and 
as  assistant  of  a  leading  country  squire  in  county 
business,  Butler  enjoyed  opportunities  of  studying 
both  human  nature  and  books.  Dr.  Nash,  the 
historian  of  Worcestershire,  who  through  an  elder 
brother's  childless  marriage  with  the  last  Russell 
heiress,  inherited  the  Strensham  estate,  speaks  of 
having  seen  in  his  youth  specimens  of  Butler's 
painting  at  Earls  Croome,  but  of  such  indifferent 
quality  that  they  had  been  used  for  patching  up 
windows.  Butler  was  afterwards  employed  in  the 
household  of  Elizabeth,  Countess  of  Kent,  in  Bedford- 
shire, where  through  most  of  the  civil  wars  he  found 
a  quiet  literary  retreat  with  a  fine  library  and  the 
companionship  of  the  learned  Selden.  He  was 
secretary  to  one  or  two  other  people  of  note,  and  held 


62  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

in  vast  esteem  for  his  wit,  learning,  and  modesty. 
The  pubhcation  of  "  Hudibras  "  was  contemporaneous 
with  the  Restoration.  As  a  satire  on  the  discredited 
Puritan  party,  at  such  a  moment,  and  above  all,  as  the 
poem  delighted  the  court,  it  seemed  certain  that  the 
fortunes  of  this  minor  bard  of  Avon  were  assured. 
The  will  does  not  seem  to  have  been  wanting,  and 
favours  were  certainly  bestowed,  in  the  form  of  money, 
which  tradition  says  Butler  merely  utilized  for  the  relief 
of  more  embarrassed  friends.  He  was  made  steward  of 
Ludlow  Castle,  under  the  president  of  the  Court  of  the 
Marches,  and  is  of  course  one  of  the  familiar  memories 
of  that  historic  place.  While  there  he  married  a  lady 
of  the  Herbert  family,  who,  Aubrey  says,  had  a  good 
fortune,  which  through  knavery  and  mishaps  Butler 
enjoyed  little  of.  The  latter  part  of  his  life  was  spent 
in  Rose  Street,  Covent  Garden,  and  there  he  died  in 
1680  in  poverty,  but  not  in  obscurity,  without  debts, 
but  with  no  means  for  a  suitable  funeral.  Yet  he  did 
not  lack  appreciative  friends,  for  Westminster  Abbey 
was  proposed.  Financial  support,  however,  at  the 
moment  was  only  equal  to  a  quiet  funeral  at  his  parish 
church  of  St.  Paul's,  Covent  Garden.  A  few  years 
later  the  further  tribute  was  added  of  an  inscribed 
monument,  while  in  1721  the  present  monument  in 
Westminster  Abbey  was  erected  by  John  Barker, 
printer  and  alderman  of  London.  There  is,  in  fact,  a 
good  deal  of  mystery  about  Butler's  life,  not  because  the 
man  himself  cultivated  any,  but  rather  that  he  cared 
nothing  for  the  grosser  enjoyments  or  fripperies  of  life. 
A  man  of  extraordinary  range  of  learning,  and  wholly 
devoted  to  literature,  destitute  of  push  or  brass,  and 
asking  only  the  necessities  of  life,  he  would  seem  to 
have  carried  self-effacement  a  little  too  far  in  a  careless 
age ;  though  whether  the  poverty  which  witty  versifiers 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  63 

flung  at  the  head  of  the  court  and  pubHc  after  his 
death,  was  acute  or  comparative  is  not  clear.  At  any 
rate,  Butler's  own  pride  as  well  as  his  modesty  seems  to 
have  stood  no  little  in  his  way,  and  anecdotes  are  told 
of  the  indignation  with  which,  in  the  later  and  more 
indigent  period  of  his  life,  he  rejected  the  proffered  gifts 
of  great  persons.  For  there  were  no  two  opinions 
about  his  merits  and  deserts.  One  might  fancy  that 
though  only  a  Strensham  yeoman's  son,  the  tempera- 
ment of  one  of  Nature's  gentlemen  had  developed  into 
something  more  definite  through  close  association  with 
families  who  may  be  fairly  supposed  to  have  treasured, 
unpolluted  by  the  court,  the  best  ideals  of  English  life, 
and  given  Butler  such  rare  and  worthy  pride.  This, 
at  any  rate,  is  what  the  friends  of  his  old  age  seem  to 
imply,  even  if  it  were  not  plain  enough  in  the  memorial 
they  raised  to  him  in  the  Covent  Garden  church  : 

A  few  plain  men  to  pomp  and  state  unknown 
O'er  a  poor  bard  have  raised  this  humble  stone  ; 
Victim  of  zeal,  the  matchless  "Hudibras", 
How  few,  alas!  disdain  to  cringe  and  cant 
When  'tis  the  mode  to  play  the  sycophant. 
But  oh,  let  all  be  taught  from  Butler's  fate, 
Who  hope  to  make  their  fortunes  by  the  great. 
That  wit  and  pride  are  always  dangerous  things 
And  little  faith  is  due  to  Court  and  King. 

I  have  already  alluded  to  Bredon  Hill  as  by  far  the 
most  conspicuous  physical  fact  in  the  whole  valley  of 
the  Avon.  It  is  not  often  that  you  have  an  isolated 
mass  nearly  a  thousand  feet  high  and  ten  or  a  dozen 
miles  round  its  base,  in  what  may  be  styled  the 
domesticated  parts  of  England.  Nor  is  Bredon,  with 
all  the  ground  it  covers,  a  group  of  hills,  but  it  slopes 
upon  every  side  at  varying  gradations  to  a  single 
summit  of  more  or  less  level  and  grassy  sward.  It 
is,  of  course,  an  outlier  of  the  Cotswolds,  which  range 


64    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

remains  an  unbroken  wall  upon  the  right,  but  gradually 
receding  from  us  throughout  these  chapters  as  we 
ascend  the  Avon.  Here  upon  Bredon  the  Cotswolds 
are  upon  quite  intimate  terms,  and  their  main  range 
but  four  or  five  miles  away  from  the  foot  of  this  huge 
straggler.  From  the  top  of  the  Malverns  the  hill 
of  Bredon  fills  the  eye  in  the  middle  distance  to  the 
south-west,  like  a  great  whale's  back  humped  up  above 
the  opening  of  the  Avon  valley  with  the  Cotswolds 
laying  their  trail  behind  them  till  they  break  with 
unexpected  abruptness  in  the  high  sharp  headlands 
above  Cheltenham.  There  is  nothing  wild  about 
Bredon,  nor  has  it  any  precipitous  features  to  speak 
of,  nor  any  boldness  of  outline ;  its  flanks  are  not 
abandoned  to  sheep  and  Nature,  or,  in  other  words,  to 
crisp  turf  and  ferns  or  gorse  like  the  Malverns,  for 
the  two  are  as  different  in  formation  as  they  are  in 
contour.  Tillage  and  hedgerows,  the  big  timber  of 
more  than  one  park,  spinneys  and  rotation  grasses, 
all  climb  a  long  way  up  Bredon  as  they  do  up  the 
opposing  heights  of  Cotswold.  Massive  as  it  is, 
distinguished  too  in  its  domination  of  the  Avon 
valley,  when  the  stranger  gets  to  close  quarters  he 
might  be  apt  to  think  it  just  a  little  too  domestic, 
for  its  very  respectable  altitude,  and  that  it  does  not 
"  keep  itself  to  itself  "  as  such  a  hill  might  perhaps  be 
expected  to  do  by  any  one  with  a  general  grasp  of 
British  hill  scenery.  The  circle  of  eight  or  ten  villages 
that  so  picturesquely  hug  its  foot  throw  their  influence 
a  long  way  up  the  hillside  and  leave  but  a  few  acres 
of  natural  turf  upon  the  summit.  This  draping  of 
Bredon  with  fields  and  hedges  and  woods  and  park 
lands  may  to  some  of  course  commend  itself.  For  my 
part,  I  like  a  hill  or  a  range  of  any  height  to  shake  itself 
free  of  the  trammels  that  fittingly  adorn  the  lower 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  65 

world  as  soon  as  may  reasonably  be,  and  present  the 
contrast  which  seems  its  mission,  together  with  that 
subtle  suggestion  of  mystery  and  aloofness  that  should 
surely  belong  to  the  appeal  of  an  open  hilltop  to  the 
world  below. 

Just  beyond  the  mouth  of  Avon  and  across  the 
Severn  there  lies  a  county  distinguished  for  the  number 
of  isolated  hills  of  moderate  height  it  throws  up  incon- 
sequently  here  and  there  about  its  surface,  nearly  all 
of  which  are  luxuriantly  clad  with  the  foliage  of 
deciduous  trees — not  scrub  pines.  These  eminences 
scattered  over  Herefordshire  are  admirable,  though 
Heaven  forbid  that  our  open  hills  and  mountains  of 
greater  stature  should  be  afforested  and  aesthetically 
ruined.  But  Bredon  is  a  little  too  big  and  important 
for  the  homely  trappings  of  the  low  country,  if  one  may 
use  such  a  metaphor,  to  encroach  as  they  do  so  close 
upon  its  summit.  The  prospect  from  this  one  is 
notable  and  far-reaching,  but  as  I  worked  my  way  up, 
on  the  Avon  and  steepest  side,  I  rather  resented 
travelling  for  a  long  distance  quite  near  the  top, through 
beds  of  nettles  waist-high  and  the  feel  of  the  rough 
and  knotty  clay  surface  of  the  grass  beneath,  and 
that  too  among  fences  which  would  not  be  shaken  off 
till  almost  the  last  moment.  Bredon,  in  short,  is  not  a 
hospitable  and  alluring  hill  to  the  rambler  in  the  same 
sense  as  its  fellows  in  other  parts  of  the  county,  though, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  Gloucester  actually  claims  a  good 
slice  of  it.  Clent  and  Woodbury,  and  of  course  the 
Malverns,  bare  their  breasts  of  virgin,  bracken-sprinkled 
turf  to  the  unrestricted  movements  of  the  climber. 
But  Bredon  suggests  potential  notices  to  trespassers 
upon  all  sides  and  the  whole  way  up,  and  might  almost 
intimidate  the  considerate  and  sensitive  wanderer. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  the  stranger  of  reasonable  behaviour 
5 


66    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

may,  I  think,  venture  anywhere,  and  so  far  as  I  noticed, 
during  a  fairly  long  sojourn  within  touch  of  the  hill, 
there  was  no  sort  of  anxiety  to  achieve  its  modest 
conquest  manifested  by  strangers  or  natives.  The  top- 
most plateau,  however,  is  pleasant  turf  enough,  and 
having  reached  it  one  immediately  encounters,  standing 
near  together,  a  rude  prehistoric  monolith  known  as 
the  "  Banbury  stone  ",  and  a  comparatively  modern 
tower  of  observation,  erected  by  a  long-departed  country 
squire.  But  the  pilgrim,  when  he  has  reached  this 
culmination  of  his  not  very  exacting  efforts,  will  surely, 
if  the  atmosphere  remain  unclouded,  defer  attention 
to  such  minor  matters  in  the  glorious  prospect  which 
bursts  upon  him  and  that  too  almost  of  a  sudden,  from 
the  western  ascent. 

It  is  not,  to  be  sure,  quite  such  as  that  afforded  by 
the  Worcestershire  beacon  on  the  Malvern  Hills,  whose 
mountainous-looking  range,  not  a  dozen  hills  away, 
seizes  the  very  first  glance  thrown  from  here  across  the 
Severn.  But  then  where  is  there  a  prospect  quite  like 
that  one  in  respect  to  variety  of  surface  and  of  human 
interest,  in  short,  of  such  significance  ?  What  is  more 
to  the  purpose,  however,  of  readers  of  this  little  book, 
so  far  as  any  purpose  can  be  served  by  dwelling  on  the 
outlook  from  a  hilltop,  you  can  follow  the  windings  of 
the  Avon  from  the  top  of  Bredon,  with  a  gleam  here 
and  there  of  its  waters,  to  Pershore  and  to  Evesham. 
And  beyond  Evesham  you  may  readily  throw  the  eye 
over  the  rich,  gentle,  undulations  through  which  the 
Avon  winds  to  Stratford  ;  you  can  follow,  too,  the  low 
confusion  of  hills  that  bounds  the  valley  on  the  north 
or  north-west,  or  again  upon  the  other  side  the  sharp 
curves  of  the  loftier  Cotswold  wall  ending  with  fine 
accentuation  in  the  distant  and  memorable  ridge  of 
Edgehill.     Nor  least,  perhaps,  if  susceptible  to  a  first 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  67 

glance  at  regions  that  have  acquired  fame  of  another 
kind  throughout  England,  you  can  look  right  down 
upon  the  rich  vale  of  Evesham,  whose  claim  to  be  called 
the  garden  of  England,  unlike  most  others,  has  really 
some  logic  in  it.     A  red  soil,  too,  is  the  best  of  ground- 
work for  any  landscape  to  rest  upon.     Upon  this  one, 
sprinkled  with  hamlets  and  churches,  are  spread  the 
vast  orchards  of  the  famous  Pershore  plum  and  others  of 
apples  and  pears  whence  flow  perennial  and  invigorat- 
ing streams  of  cider  and  perry.     Doctors,  I  am  told, 
are  everyvvhere  expressing  their  deliberate  opinion  that 
the  first  of  these  at  any  rate  is  a  positive  enemy  to  gout 
and  rheumatism,  and  as  no  one  could  possibly  get 
"  forrader  "  on  cider  as  now  manufactured  in  these  parts, 
one  may  assume,  if  rashly,  that  the  most  fanatic  temper- 
ancetrumpeterwould  notwish  to  submerge  so  innocuous 
an  industry  in  rivers  of  ginger  beer.     There  are  many 
other  things  of  profit,  raised  by  intensive  culture  in  the 
vale  of  Evesham,  which  cannot  truthfully  be  said  to 
adorn  the  landscape.     For  neither  fields  of  asparagus, 
nor  strawberries,  nor  French  beans,  nor  red  currants, 
are  in  real  life  things  of  harmony  or  beauty  in  five  or  ten 
acre  plots.     But  these  interludes,  with  such  small  show 
as  they  might  make  at  a  distance,  blend  readily  with 
the  subdued  reddish  tone  that  glimmers  everywhere 
through  the  green.     And,  after  all,  pasture  and  hayfield 
and  waving  grain  strike  their  note  freely  as  elsewhere 
in  any  survey  of  the  vale  of  Evesham,  while  woods 
mantle  in  abundance  round  country  seats,  and  hedge- 
row, timber,  that  unfailing  solace  of  even  the  tamest 
English  scenery,  luxuriates  here  also,  where  the  land- 
scape is  anything  but  tame,  and  that,  too,  in  exceptional 
abundance.     For  looking  over  the  southern  edge  of  the 
flat  top  of  Bredon  towards  the  adjacent  Cotswolds  and 
their  foothills,  you  have  a  somewhat  differing  prospect. 


68    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

From  more  distant  Broadway  to  Winchcomb,  and 
from  Winchcomb  on  to  Cleeve,  overlooking  Cheltenham, 
you  have  an  altogether  more  broken  outlook,  a  happy 
procession  of  folding  hillsides  and  combes  draped  here 
and  there  by  a  curtain  of  hanging  woodland.  Nearer 
yet,  in  the  valley  between,  which  is  only  crossed 
laterally  by  trifling  brooks  stealing  unseen  towards 
the  Avon,  are  other  isolated  upstanding  hills  not 
greatly  lower  than  Bredon  itself  in  height,  but  alto- 
gether overawed  by  that  assertive  monster. 

And  though  Bredon,  to  be  sure,  is  not  the  Worcester- 
shire beacon,  it  so  entirely  overlooks  the  Severn  that 
you  can  realize  what  this  western  rival  of  the  Thames 
has  meant  in  English  history,  with  sufficient  clarity  ; 
even  from  here  upon  its  other  bank,  you  may  picture  if 
you  choose  the  wide  impassable  brackish  lagoon  that 
at  the  Roman  invasion  sagged  upwards  to  Bewdley 
and  the  Shropshire  border,  and  for  centuries  afterwards 
made  cleavages  that  cannot  be  overestimated.  On  the 
farther  shores  a  broken  sea  of  hills,  even  now  another 
country  altogether  from  this  upon  which  Bredon  stands, 
fades  away  into  the  mountains  of  Wales.  Even  before 
the  time  of  the  Romans  one  is  fairly  assured  by  their 
operations  that  the  Severn  was  a  great  racial  boundary. 
Upon  this  side  were  the  Cornivii.and  after  their  conquest 
upon  the  further  shore  lay  the  indomitable  Silurians, 
who  under  their  chief  Caractacus,  as  Tacitus  describes 
to  us,  gave  the  Roman  generals  such  long  and  arduous 
campaigns.  In  the  Saxon  times,  after  their  first 
conquering  armies  had  crossed  the  Cotswolds  and 
devastated  the  Severn  valley  to  Shrewsbury,  and  in 
much  later  days  when  the  Mercians  extended  a  peaceful 
rule  into  Herefordshire,  it  is  tolerably  certain  the 
Celt  across  the  Severn  remained  in  great  force  upon 
the  soil. 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  69 

One  feels  as  strongly  that  upon  this  side  the 
Severn  the  Saxon  was  as  much  in  evidence  in  blood 
as  in  domination.  Every  one  who  is  concerned  with 
such  things  would  pronounce  the  Avon  valley  to 
have  been  before  the  Norman  Conquest  practically 
as  Saxon  or  English  as  Wiltshire.  But  as  late  as 
Cromwell's  time  the  Welsh  language  was  commonly 
spoken  in  the  streets  of  Hereford,  and  till  quite  recent 
times  was  the  mother-tongue  of  fragments  even  of 
trans-Severn  Gloucestershire,  while  Monmouth,  trench- 
ing on  the  tidal  shores  of  the  expanding  river,  is 
racially  a  Welsh  county.  Worcestershire  again,  north 
of  the  Avon  valley,  was  almost  a  forest  wilderness  even 
east  of  the  Severn  till  quite  late  Saxon  times,  and  west 
of  it  still  more  so,  thereby  greatly  helping  to  accentuate 
the  cleavage.  Offa,  King  of  Mercia,  had  his  dyke,  that 
we  all  know,  dividing  Herefordshire  and  Saxon  colonies 
from  the  Welsh,  beyond  a  doubt.  But  we  know  also 
of  Welsh  communities  on  this  side  of  it  retaining 
Welsh  laws,  yet  absolutely  loyal  to  the  Saxon  earls. 
The  moment,  again,  that  you  cross  the  Severn  to-day 
the  Welsh  accent  begins  to  make  some  faint  assertion. 
There  is  nothing  of  it  in  the  Avon  valley  or  on  the 
Cotswold  Hills.  One  might  continue  the  survey  into  the 
Middle  Ages,  when  war  was  the  chronic  state  of  the 
Welsh  marches,  and  if  the  chief  conflict  seldom  reached 
the  bank  of  the  Severn,  the  men  who  lived  there  were 
involved  by  service  in  its  turmoil  and  responsibilities, 
while  those  upon  the  hither  side  led  as  peaceful  lives 
in  the  interval  of  great  national  civil  wars  as  the  men 
of  Devon  or  Wiltshire.  As  embodying  that  suggestion 
of  a  boundary  which  the  name  of  Severn  conveys,  one 
may  recall  the  scene  in  "Henry  IV  ",  where  Shakespeare 
makes  Percy,  Mortimer,  and  Glyndwr  divide  the  realm 
of  England  between  them,  and  how  the  Severn  was 


70  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

naturally  cast  as  the  frontier  of  the  kingdom  of  Wales. 
Nor  was  this  scheme  of  partition  a  mere  figment  of 
Shakespeare's  brain,  but  a  sufficiently  accurate  pre- 
sentation of  the  "  tripartite  convention  "  entered  into 
by  the  three  partners  in  the  fourth  year  of  Glyndwr's 
war.  The  Severn  in  this  connection  is  greater  in 
history  than  the  Thames ;  such  racial  or  political 
divisions  as  that  great  river  marked  in  prehistoric 
times  may  or  may  not  have  meant  as  much  as  the 
frontier  of  the  Silurian  nation.  But  in  Saxon  times 
the  age-long  conflict  of  Celt  and  Teuton  had  no  sort 
of  parallel  in  the  quarrels  of  Saxon  kingdoms.  Much 
more,  however,  than  these  definite  blood  wars  the  sense 
of  boundary  remained  long  and  always  and  for  good 
reason  about  the  Severn.  "  The  land  beyond  Severn  " 
is  one  of  the  fixed  geographical  phrases  of  almost  all 
our  history  and  meant  a  great  deal.  The  river  itself, 
one  might  almost  fancy,  marked  its  character  by  a 
compromise  between  Welsh  and  Midland.  It  is  neither 
rocky  like  the  Wye,  nor  muddy  like  the  Avon.  Shakes- 
peare, with  his  fehcitous  accuracy  of  touch,  sings 
of  it  as  "  sandy-bottomed  Severn  ",  which  precisely 
describes  it  and  it  alone  of  big  rivers.  Even  the  salmon, 
as  we  know,  treat  it  absolutely  as  a  line  of  demarcation, 
rejecting  utterly  any  acquaintance  with  the  tributaries 
on  its  eastern  shore.  Everywhere  from  Shrewsbury 
to  its  mouth  its  passage  marks  a  division  in  all  things 
either  immediate  or  impending  for  any  one  with  eyes 
to  see  or  ears  to  hear. 

From  the  top  of  Bredon  the  whole  of  this  trans- 
Severn  country  shows  a  broken  heaped  up  surface. 
What  with  the  Malverns  near  by,  the  Clee  and  Stretton 
ranges  beyond,  the  long  line  of  the  Brecon  mountains 
and  the  Radnor  moors  and  Glamorgan  highlands,  the 
whole  west    may  be    described,   in    the  language   of 


UP-STREAM  TO  BREDON  71 

metaphor,  as  in  a  state  of  unrest  and  agitation,  while 

nearer  and  more  southerly  are  the  upstanding  billowy 

ridges  that  carry  the  forest  of  Dean  and  follow  the 

Wye  to  its  confluence,  with  the  broad  tidal  waters  of 

the  greater  river  as  it  opens  out  towards  the  Severn 

sea.       That    such    a    magnificent    vantage    point    as 

Bredon  should  lack  the  traces  of  ancient  fortification 

is  unthinkable.     As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  are  two 

camps  :  the  one  with  a  single  rampart  about  160  by 

70  yards  in  diameter  and  known  as  Conderton ;  the 

other,  enclosing  the  Banbury  stone  and  the  tower,  is 

on  the  spot  where  we  ascended  the  hill  and  is  known 

as  Kemerton.     This  last  is  triangular  in  shape,  defined 

on  the  accessible  side  by  a  double  ditch,  but  on  the 

north  and  west  protected  by  the  escarpments  which 

here  give  the  crown  of  the  hill  a  touch  of  boldness, 

and   as    a   matter    of   fact    entail    for   the   last   fifty 

feet  or  so  no  little  scrambling.     On  the  farther  edge 

are  two  curious   monoliths   known   as   the   king  and 

queen,wh.eTe  till  recently  a  manor  court  was  periodically 

held.     The  smooth  top  of  the  hill,  too,  was  in  former 

days,  as  in  so  many  similar  situations,  the  scene  of 

village  pastimes,   in  which  the  swains  of  a  simpler 

generation  competed  in  feats  of  strength,  caring  nothing 

then  for  the  meretricious  glitter  of  distant  towns  and 

the  glamour  of  their  gregarious  anxious  life. 


CHAPTER   III 
BREDON  TO  EVESHAM 

When  Bredon  Hill  puts  on  his  hat. 
Ye  men  of  the  Vale  beware  of  that: 
When  Bredon  Hill  doth  clear  appear, 
Ye  men  of  the  Vale  have  nought  to  fear. 

IF  I  have  seemed  to  cavil  somewhat  at  Bredon 
simply  in  its  character  of  a  very  noble  hill,  unable 
to  detach  itself  sufficiently  from  lowland  civilization 
for  a  perhaps  capricious  taste,  this  very  quality  gives 
charm  to  many  of  the  habitations  that  lie  around  it, 
and  use  its  slopes  as  it  v/ere  for  their  own  greater 
adornment.  A  good  instance  of  this  confronts  one  on 
descending  again  toward  the  banks  of  Avon  in  the  fine 
old  Tudor  house  of  Woollas  Hall,  perched  about  a  third 
of  the  way  up  the  slopes  and  spreading  its  timbered 
parklands  much  higher  than  that.  It  is  a  beautiful 
old  house,  and  none  the  worse  for  not  being  over- 
large,  and  of  singularly  sequestered  and  alluring 
situation,  and  Nash  gives  the  derivation  as  a  cor- 
ruption of  Wolves  Hill.  A  gabled  house  of  Cotswold 
stone,  its  interior  still  remains  in  keeping  with 
its  period,  and  contains  among  other  things  the 
portrait  of  that  hapless  Robert  Wyntour,  who 
was  dragged  into  association  with  Catesby  in 
the  Gunpowder  Plot,  suffered  with  his  brothers  the 
extreme  and  hideous  penalties  of  treason,  and 
whose  moated  house  of  Huddington,  forlorn,  deserted, 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  73 

but  still  intact,  has  survived  for  three  centuries  the  ruin 
of  its  owners. 

The  Vampages  were  lords  of  Woollas  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  and  their  heiress  married  a  Hanford,  whose 
descendants  in  the  male  line  were  here  within  easy 
memory  and  are  still  in  possession  on  the  female  side. 
This  is  a  fine  instance  of  continuous  occupation,  and 
taken  together  with  the  beauty  of  the  house  and  the 
romantic  nature  of  the  site,  would  appeal  to  the  dullest 
dog.  What  a  perennial  sensation  this  would  be  in 
Surrey  ?  Fortunately  perhaps  for  the  owners  it  is 
tucked  away  on  a  fold  of  Bredon  Hill  and  in  a  country 
where  such  instances  are  by  no  means  unknown.  Not 
a  dozen  miles  from  this  very  spot,  but  outside  our  line  of 
progress,  I  know  an  exquisite  black  and  white  sixteenth 
century  manor  house  whose  owners  and  occupants  have 
been  there  in  the  male  line  and  in  direct  succession  a 
century  longer  than  the  building  itself  ! 

Quite  a  group  of  villages  lie  hereabout  within  a  mile 
or  two  of  one  another.  Eckington  and  Birlingham  on 
the  river,  the  two  Combertons  and  Elmley  Castle  more 
immediately  under  the  hill.  The  course  of  the  Avon 
from  Tewkesbury  to  Pershore  is  almost  due  north,  and 
Eckington  is  nearly  opposite  Strensham  church,  in 
which  neighbourhood  is  the  first  lock  above  Tewkes- 
bury. Eckington  church  has  a  fine  embattled  western 
tower  with  curious  gargoyles  worthy  of  notice.  Though 
greatly  disfigured  by  a  north  aisle  of  late  date  it  still 
retains  a  Norman  arcade  upon  the  south  side  of  the 
nave  and  a  Norman  door  with  zigzag  mouldings.  In 
the  chancel  is  one  of  those  family  monuments  in 
effigy,  that  for  me,  and  I  fancy  for  many  of  us,  have  an 
immense  fascination.  This  one,  as  might  be  expected, 
is  of  a  Hanford  and  his  wife,  temp.  1616.  Supported 
by  a  baker's  dozen  of  sons  and  daughters  all  dutifully 


74    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

kneeling  and  reduced  in  stone  or  alabaster  to  that 
prodigious  uniformity  of  filial  piety  which  stimulates 
the  more  one's  speculations  as  to  what  they  were 
severally  like  ;  which  of  the  sons  were  a  blessing  to 
their  parents  and  which  of  them  perhaps  brought  their 
grey  hairs  prematurely  to  the  splendours  of  this  gorge- 
ous resting-place.  Yet  what  models  of  devotion,  what 
examples  of  piety  they  all  look,  and  what  a  varied 
tale  no  doubt  hangs  upon  the  inscrutable  procession  ! 
And  I  am  speaking  generally,  of  course,  as  one  may 
well  do  in  a  region  so  abounding  as  this  one  in  monu- 
mental efhgies. 

The  fact  that  you  seldom  encounter  a  family 
group  numbering  less  than  double  figures  on  these 
sixteenth  and  seventeenth  century  tombs,  has  some- 
times suggested  the  fancy  that  a  less  full  quiver  was  a 
matter  of  reproach  to  the  ancients,  and  certainly  one 
not  to  be  paraded  for  posterity.  The  string  of  young 
women  always  seems,  somehow,  less  interesting,  their 
attitude  more  in  harmony  with  the  lives  one  sees  them 
in  fancy  leading.  Their  careers  contained  less  sug- 
gestion of  variety  and  fewer  dramatic  possibilities. 
They  married  more  freely  beyond  a  doubt  than  their 
twentieth  century  successors.  I  recall  the  twentieth 
century  aunt,  that  familiar  repository  of  family 
traditions  whom  most  of  us  know,  that  amiable  spinster 
whose  genealogical  reputation  rests  on  the  brief  she 
holds  for  the  greater  glorification  of  her  tribal  forbears. 
I  know  her  so  well  with  her  delightful  cocksureness 
and  her  beautiful  ignorance  of  old  social  England, 
her  gentle  prattle  of  the  taint  of  trade,  the  exclusive 
devotion  of  the  family,  the  Army,  the  Church,  and 
the  Bar,  and  other  shibboleths  of  the  day  before 
yesterday.  And  Aunt  Maria  "  who  knows  all  about 
these  things  "  is  the  final  appeal,  as  it  were,  of  so  tre- 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  75 

mendous  if  indifferent  a  following,  that  she  must  excuse 
me  for  taking  her  name  in  vain  in  the  interests  of  truth 
and  verity.  I  can  hear  her  comfortably  disposing  of 
the  hands  of  the  six  dutiful  young  women  kneeling  at 
the  head  of  the  mount  among  as  many  country  squires, 
oblivious  of  arithmetic  or  of  the  fact  that  the  Tudor 
or  Jacobean  squire  was  not  permitted  a  harem.  And 
what  would  she  do  with  the  five  practically  penniless 
sons,  who  kneel  behind  the  elder  brother  in  doublet  and 
sword.  Here  I  feel  quite  sure  she  would  settle  them 
quite  simply  in  the  Church,  the  Navy,  the  Army,  and  the 
Bar,  with  amysteriousgovernment  appointment  perhaps 
for  the  odd  one,  and  this  in  all  the  fullest  nineteenth 
century  signilicance  of  these  honourable  professions. 
And  who  did  the  five  daughters  marry  ?  For  one  only 
is  due  by  the  law  of  averages  to  an  eldest  son.  Some 
of  them  beyond  doubt,  and  with  the  full  approval  of 
their  parents,  married  gentlemen  whose  situation  and 
avocation  would  in  the  retrospect  horrify  Aunt  Maria 
and  utterly  shatter  her  gentle  delusions.  We  may 
partly  account  for  the  daughters'  fortunes  by  a  glance 
at  the  probable  fate  of  the  five  sons.  And  here  again 
I  do  not  mean  the  Hanford  progeny  that  have  fortuit- 
ously aroused  this  dissertation,  but  any  of  these  many 
hundred  groups  of  olive  branches  that  kneel  or  stand 
obscure  and  nameless  to  a  stranger's  eye  around  their 
glorified  and  immortalized  parents.  One  probably, 
as  we  are  in  Worcestershire  was  apprenticed  to  a 
clothier  in  Worcester,  Tewkesbury,  or  Kidderminster, 
and  if  fortunate  became  one  himself,  a  stout  burgher, 
and  alderman,  and  progenitor  of  substantial  shop- 
keepers, and  when  he  "  carried  "  (the  expression  is 
still  used  in  rural  America)  his  wife  on  a  pillion  behind 
him  over  the  miry  roads  to  keep  Christmas  with  the 
squire  at  the  old  house,  you  may  be  quite  certain  that 


76    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

not  a  glimmer  of  awkwardness  or  consciousness  of  any 
social  relapse  existed  in  the  minds  of  either  the  ladies  or 
the  gentlemen.  One  was  the  eldest  brother,  the  other 
a  younger  one,  that  was  all,  and  the  whole  situation  was 
absolutely  normal. 

There  were  no  London  airs  and  graces  and  standards. 
They  were  all  rustic  folk  together  if  well-bred  ones, 
and  local  interests  were  all  sufficient  in  normal  times. 
If  the  squire  had  a  little  loose  cash  he  very  likely  joined 
with  his  burgher  brother  in  the  venture  of  a  cargo 
of  cloth  or  hats  shipped  down  the  Severn  from 
Kidderminster,  or  Bewdley  to  Bristol.  He  would 
have  been  astounded  if  you  had  told  him  that  such  a 
proceeding  soiled  his  escutcheon.  There  was  a  good 
deal  of  difference  between  a  Tudor  squire  and  a 
feudal  baron  of  the  preceding  centuries,  though  the 
first  was  sometimes  a  descendant  of  the  last. 

And  what  of  the  other  younger  brothers  ?  If  a 
mercer  in  London  offered  an  opening,  we  know  very 
well  the  chance  was  jumped  at.  There  was  no 
standing  army,  but  a  few  household  regiments  mono- 
polized by  the  nobility  and  their  favourites  ;  but  the 
career  of  a  soldier  of  fortune  in  an  English  corps  in 
foreign  service  or  in  foreign  legions  might  possibly 
account  for  one  of  six  sons.  With  the  naval  ventures 
of  the  west  country,  and  the  Cinque  Ports,  we  may 
be  quite  sure  a  squire's  son  of  an  inland  county  had 
rarely  any  traffic.  But  the  plantations,Virginia,  Mary- 
land, the  Carolinas,  and  the  West  Indies  particularly, 
might  fairly  be  credited  with  one  of  a  large  family. 

The  Church — that  depends  on  the  period,  and 
this  one  was  far  from  the  day  of  the  family  name  in 
the  family  living.  A  mercer  or  a  clothier  was  much 
better  than  the  Church,  a  pretty  poor  livelihood 
and  prospect  in  the  seventeenth  century,  save  when 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  -jf 

exceptional  brains  promised  an  Oxford  fellowship  or 
quick  preferment. 

The  Bar  was  a  later  development  of  younger  son 
enterprise,  when   squires  grew  rich   and   commercial 
activity  waxed  in  later  Georgian  times.     In  earlier 
days  it  was  an  exclusive  and  expensive  luxury,  more 
adapted  to  heirs  in  their  father's  lifetime  or  men  of 
special  aptitude.     The  lists  of  beneficed  clergy  in  this 
county  and  such  others  as  I   have  been  concerned 
with,  do  not  suggest  any  passion  of  the  younger  son 
for  the  Church  at  this  period,  and  perhaps  no  wonder. 
There  were  plenty  of  other  openings.     The  lease  of  a 
farm  not  uncommonly,  or,  again,  the  calling  of   an 
attorney.     Nor    must    one    forget    those    positions, 
possible  at  that  period,  in  the  households  of  the  great 
nobility.     Something  of   an   upper   servant,  perhaps, 
but  softened  by  the  common  table  in  the  banqueting 
hall,  also  by  custom  and  the  possibility  of  fortune  and 
advancement  for  a  likely  youth,  who  as  a  gentleman 
was  eligible  if  his  parents  could  justify  it.     I  shall  be 
accused   of   diffuseness   in   thus   tarrying  among  the 
tombs,    I    am    quite    sure,    by    some    critics.      But 
educated  Americans,  if   I   know  them  at  all,   and   I 
ought    to,   care    for   such    things,    and    they   greatly 
frequent  this  pleasant  region,   as  every  one  knows. 
Aunt  Maria  flourishes  in  America  too,  as  my  American 
readers  will  bear  me  out  in  saying,  particularly  in  the 
South.     I  have  known  intimately  at  least  a  score  of 
them  on  their  native  heath  ;   like  our  own,  encyclo- 
paedias in  all  matters  of  kinship — recent  kinship,  that 
is — but  yet  more  unpractical  and   idealistic  in   their 
social    pictures    of    the    past,    even    their    own    com- 
paratively recent  past.     But  when  they  pursue  it  to 
the  original  emigrant,  the  squire's  son,  if  by  good  luck 
he  is  not  a  lord's — the  brother,  as  we  have  seen,  of 


78    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

the  haberdasher,  the  clothier,  deemed  then  more 
lucky  than  he — the  shade  of  this  adventurous  young 
man  would  be  amazed  at  the  primal  dignity  with  which 
time  and  distance  have  invested  him. 

At  any  rate  he  looks  well  here,  and  perhaps  a  little 
misleading  in  the  dummy  procession  with  sword  and 
ruff,  even  though  at  the  moment  he  were  clad  in 
deerskin  coat  and  moccasins,  and  shaking  with  ague 
in  a  clap-board  shanty  on  the  shores  of  the  Chesapeake. 
But,  of  course,  there  were  some  families,  even  then 
when  a  lord  was  a  lord,  and  of  whom  there  were  only 
sixty  in  the  House  of  Peers,  who  were  practically  as 
great  as  noblemen  and  lived  upon  a  higher  plane. 
We  are  concerned  here,  however,  with  the  rule  and 
not  the  exception. 

Just  beyond  Eckington  the  Pershore  road  crosses 
the  Avon  by  one  of  those  red  brick  bridges  of  many 
arches — six  in  this  case — that  are  such  a  familiar  and 
harmonious  feature  of  the  stream.  Birlingham,  set  in 
a  horseshoe  loop  of  the  river  to  the  east  of  the  road, 
follows  almost  immediately.  Lying  among  meadows 
and  orchards  this  village  has  a  more  well-cared-for 
air  even  than  its  neighbours  in  a  region  where  extreme 
picturesqueness  of  village  architecture  is  not  often 
associated  with  dilapidation,  a  fact  that  may  be  due 
to  a  group  of  gentlemen's  houses  centring  in  and 
around  it.  The  church  was  originally  Norman,  but, 
with  the  exception  of  a  perpendicular  embattled  tower 
with  a  small  corner  spire,  has  been  practically  rebuilt 
in  modern  times.  But  even  a  fact,  so  disappointing 
always  to  the  stranger,  has  a  little  indirect  interest 
here,  as  the  rebuilding  was  largely  achieved  at  the 
cost  of  a  brother  of  the  poet  Walter  Savage  Landor, 
who  was  its  rector  for  forty  years.  The  poet 
himself  long  outlived  the  parson,  dying  at   a   great 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  79 

age  but  twenty  years  ago.  Sons  of  a  north-country 
landed  family,  the  sharp  contrast  between  the  careers 
of  the  two  brothers  suggests  itself  irresistibly  while 
standing  in  Birlingham  churchyard.  The  poet  who, 
in  a  moment  of  youthful  impetuosity,  and  fascinated 
by  the  romance  of  Llanthony  Abbey,  bought  the 
whole  valley  in  which  it  stood,  achieved  speedy 
failure  as  a  Welsh  squire,  and  went  abroad  for  nearly 
the  whole  of  his  long  life  ;  the  other  one,  to  strike 
roots  in  the  next  county  of  so  exceptionally  deep 
and  intimate  a  kind.  Nafford  Lock  and  mill  are  close 
to  Birlingham  and  make  one  of  those  many  pleasant 
and  brief  interludes  in  the  river's  journey,  where  its 
placid  mood  is  lashed  into  a  lively  foaming  pool,  and 
its  normal  currents  so  slow  and  deep,  expanded  for 
the  moment  into  shallows  bubbling  over  gravelly  beds. 
Great  and  Little  Comberton  look  over  towards 
Birlingham,  the  former  two  miles  away  on  the  farther 
side  of  the  stream,  but  away  from  the  main  road  and 
lying  under  the  lee  of  Bredon  Hill,  the  other  a  mile 
on  towards  Pershore.  Great  Comberton  church,  with 
embattled  western  tower,  decorated  nave,  and  modern 
chancel  stands  just  aloof  from  its  pleasant  village  and  is 
worth  a  visit  for  its  curious  wagon  roof,  which  covers 
a  nave  of  uncommon  breadth  for  its  short  length. 
Little  Comberton  is  a  mere  hamlet,  but  its  old  church, 
rising  above  a  well-wooded  graveyard  at  the  parting 
of  three  pleasant  and  leafy  ways,  would  give  the 
traveller  pause,  if  only  for  its  perfection  as  a  roadside 
scene,  for  across  the  way  a  group  of  old  half- 
timbered  houses,  fronting  the  church  gate  and  flanked 
by  an  orchard,  rounds  off  the  picture.  The  body 
of  the  church,  attached  to  an  early  perpendicular 
tower,  is  curious,  with  a  chancel  overtopping  the 
nave  and  a  double-gabled  south  transept.     The  north 


8o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

doorway  is  Norman  and  has  a  remarkable  tympanum 
showing  a  cross  surrounded  by  several  comical  orna- 
ments said  to  be  intended  for  clouds,  while  some  of 
the  windows  contain  fragments  of  old  glass. 

Of  the  three  roads  which  meet  here,  one  leads  back 
for  a  mile  to  the  northern  foot  of  Bredon  Hill,  beneath 
which  lies  the  most  picturesque  of  all  its  villages. 
Certainly  in  its  lavish  display  of  black  and  white  houses 
Elmley  Castle  justifies  the  distinction.  The  grassy 
foundations  of  a  castle,  owned  and  not  seldom  occupied 
by  the  Beauchamps,  Earls  of  Warwick,  account  for 
part  of  the  name,  and  one  may  fairly  suppose  that 
the  fine  display  of  elm  timber  in  the  hall  grounds, 
showing  up  well  against  the  green  background  of 
Bredon,  which  is  here  both  steep  and  grassy,  may  have 
had  remote  ancestors  which  accounted  for  the  rest. 
The  church,  too,  in  its  spacious  level  graveyard,  lying 
back  from  the  two  wide  streets  of  the  old  timber- 
built  village  against  the  foot  of  the  steep  hill,  is  a 
dignified  and  venerable  specimen  of,  for  the  most 
part.  Perpendicular  work  with  a  massive  Norman 
tower.  Free  from  the  wearisome  crocketed  orna- 
mentation which,  to  my  thinking,  is  such  a  blemish 
to  the  obvious  merits  of  the  Perpendicular,  the  plain 
crenellation  of  the  long,  flat-roofed  north  aisle  and 
the  gable  of  the  north  chancel  and  the  massive  porch, 
set  off  to  perfection  the  old  flagged  and  gabled  roofs 
of  nave  and  chancel  showing  behind. 

The  manor  was  granted  to  the  Savage  family,  and 
within  the  church  is  a  magnificent  altar  tomb  of  date 
1616,  bearing  three  of  their  effigies,  two  men  and  a 
woman,  with  great  and  instructive  elaboration  of 
contemporary  costume.  There  is  also  a  fine  half- 
recumbent  marble  effigy  of  the  first  Earl  of  Coventry, 
temp.  1699.     The  Savages  were  squires  here  for  three 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  8i 

centuries  and  have  only  lapsed  within  living  memory. 
Bishop  Bonner  is  said  to  have  been  an  illegitimate 
son  of  the  house.  In  the  churchyard  is  a  curious 
sundial  about  eight  feet  high,  bearing  among  other 
ornamentation  the  arms  of  the  family.  At  Netherton, 
half  a  mile  from  the  village,  there  is  the  curious 
remnant  of  a  very  ancient  little  church  long  used 
for  secular  purposes.  It  still  contains  some  beautiful 
Norman  doorways  and  an  Early  English  bell  turret 
in  perfect  preservation.  On  the  tympanum  of  a 
doorway  is  carved  a  flying  dragon.  The  history  of 
this  forlorn  relic  of  mediaeval  piety  was  quite  elusive 
so  far  as  my  efforts  to  gather  something  of  it  were 
concerned.  The  pilgrim,  not  bound  for  the  noble 
shrine  at  Pershore  as  we  are,  may  bend  round  the 
north  and  western  side  of  Bredon  Hill,  and  by  lovely 
twisting  lanes,  flowery  ways  in  very  truth,  as  are  all 
in  this  rich  country,  he  will  get  eventually  to  Ashton- 
under-the-Hill,  with  the  village  cross  and  its  due  com- 
plement of  delectable  buildings  of  timber  and  wattle 
or  of  rich  Cotswold  stone. 

Still  hugging  the  green  base  of  the  presiding  genius 
of  the  vale  he  will  pass  through  the  village  of  Overbury 
and  one  seat  of  the  Martins,  of  the  well-known  London 
banking-house,  but  an  old  Worcestershire  stock, 
planted  here  for  many  generations  and  to  good  purpose. 
And  Overbury  completes  the  long  circuit  of  the  hill, 
for  it  is  but  a  journey  thence  to  Bredon  Norton  and 
Bredon,  where  in  fancy  we  tied  our  boat,  hired  from 
Mr.  Bathurst  of  Tewkesbury,  in  the  last  chapter. 
But  in  this  one  we  have  at  Little  Comberton  got 
within  touch  of  Pershore,  and  a  pleasant  winding 
highway,  after  a  mile  or  so,  crosses  the  Avon  again, 
and  Pershore,  clustering  around  its  beautiful  abbey 
church  tower,  lies  in  front  of  us  slightly  raised  above 
6 


82    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

the  vale.  Here  is  another  of  those  mellow  red  brick 
bridges  of  many  years  and  many  arches,  that  are  so 
well  attuned  to  the  local  atmosphere  and  to  the  Avon's 
gentle  streams.  For  the  moment,  however,  these  last 
are  making  one  of  those  sporadic  efforts  to  emulate 
the  stir  of  a  trout  stream  that  they  are  not  often 
moved  to  without  adventitious  aid.  And  as  the 
stream  expands  beneath  the  bridge — leaving  a  deep 
pool  in  the  centre,  but  rippling  otherwise  over  gravelly 
shallows,  I  have  often  loitered  and  hung  over  theparapet 
of  the  central  arch  of  the  old  bridge  and  watched 
the  chub  rising  at  flies  and  surface  food.  Sailing  out 
like  trout  into  the  livelier  water  and  like  trout  poising 
themselves  motionless  near  the  surface,  they  are 
readily  visible,  while  every  now  and  again  they  break 
the  water  after  some  drowned  fly  or  fragment  of 
refuse  from  the  mill  above.  Our  friend  the  chub  is 
naturally  addicted  to  lying  in  deep,  secluded  water, 
beneath  some  overhanging  leafy  bank,  and  sucking 
quietly  in  such  winged  morsels  as  come  his  way,  and 
sometimes  to  his  undoing  a  well-presented  imitation 
with  a  sharp  hook  in  it.  But  when  Mr.  Chub  gets 
into  lively  water,  and  of  late  years  those  of  the  Severn 
basin  have  shown  a  quite  inconvenient  predilection 
for  it,  and  thrusts  himself  up  into  the  mountain 
streams,  he  is  obviously  possessed  of  the  conceit  that 
he  will  make  a  good  imitation  of  the  nobler  native, 
and  seizes  the  angler's  trout  fly  too  often,  as  I  can 
amply  testify,  in  places  where  he  has  no  business  what- 
ever, and  is  not  wanted  at  all.  But  here  in  the  Avon 
and  the  Severn  is  his  natural  habitat, and  speakingfrom 
observation  only,  but  from  an  extremely  prolonged 
and,  I  may  fairly  claim,  a  sympathetic  observation, 
I  should  opine  that  the  chub,  the  roach,  and  all  other 
fish  that  haunt  the  Avon,  leave  the  lures  of  its  thousand 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  83 

anglers  as  severely  alone  as  is  possible  for  any  fish 
to  be  capable  of  without  destroying  the  last  spark 
of  that  hope  which  springs  eternal  in  the  angler's 
breast.  I  do  not  remember  whether  the  immortal 
Izaak  says  anything  of  the  Avon.  He  probably 
fished  it,  as  we  know  he  was  at  Worcester,  and  his  wife 
lies  buried  there.  But  things  have  changed  in  this 
particular  vastly  since  his  day.  Whole  stretches  of 
the  river,  as  those  of  the  Severn,  are  literally  lined 
with  float  fishermen  as  close  as  the  decencies  of  even 
float  fishermen  permit,  and  that  is  pretty  handy  to 
one  another,  to  take  no  count  of  those  occasional 
solitaries  that  you  find  planted  in  lonely  spots  over 
the  hundred  and  odd  miles  of  bank. 

I  have  watched  both  the  Avon  and  the  Severn 
angler  in  batches  of  twenty,  in  groups  of  three  or 
four,  in  pairs,  and  in  singles.  I  do  not  mean  cynically 
passed  them  by  after  the  manner  of  Dr.  Johnson  and 
his  followers  with  a  foolish  sneer,  but,  on  the  contrary, 
with  the  interest  of  a  fellow-angler.  I  have  watched 
them  in  all  conceivable  parts  of  both  rivers  between 
Worcester  and  Stratford  for  considerable  periods, 
fascinated  by  the  almost  inconceivable  discrepancy  of 
the  combined  effort  and  the  poverty  of  result.  I 
have  watched  them  in  June  and  July,  in  August  and 
September,  and  less  patiently  their  thinned  ranks  in 
drear  November.  I  have  watched  them  in  the  morn- 
ing, the  afternoon,  and  the  evening,  in  cloud  and 
sunshine,  in  dry  weather  and  in  wet.  I  have  occasion- 
ally even  sat  on  the  bank  with  one  or  other  and  listened 
to  the  relation  of  red  letter-days  spent  upon  the  very 
self-same  swim,  and  watched  the  pitilessly  steady  quill, 
with  sympathetic  and  ever  sanguine  eye,  drift  slowly 
past  again  and  again,  or  sail  round  and  round  in  one 
of  those  likely  little  wliiripools  that  a  thrusting  willow 


84    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

and  a  hollow  bank  provide  betimes  for  the  tloat  tisher- 
man.  And  with  all  this,  quite  inadequately  conveying, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  extent  of  effort  that  circum- 
stances have  brought  before  my  notice,  I  solemnly 
protest  I  have  never  seen  a  single  fish  caught,  and  only 
once  or  twice  witnessed  the  familiar  and  unmistakable 
sign  on  any  angler's  part  that  he  had  had  a  bite.  Yet 
all  these  enthusiasts,  respectable  working  men  mostly, 
with  a  fair  sprinkling  of  a  higher  degree  :  young  men 
and  old,  boys  and  greybeards,  every  one,  with  rare 
exception,  out  of  conversational  touch  with  his  neigh- 
bour, were  beyond  doubt  happy :  men  unmistakably 
of  a  clear  conscience,  or  they  would  not  spend  their 
holiday  in  such  prolonged  and  entire  communion  alone 
with  it.  Men  of  reflective  habit,  too,  beyond  a  doubt 
are  these,  philosophers  perhaps  some  of  them,  inarticu- 
late poets  others,  and  like  hundreds  of  fishermen  keenly 
alive  to  the  whisper  of  the  reeds,  the  sway  of  the  willows, 
the  scent  of  the  meadows,  and  all  those  blends  of  sight 
and  sound  and  sense  that  are  inseparably  but  indescrib- 
ably bound  up  with  the  mysterious  fascination  that 
centres  as  strongly  on  a  quill  float  by  a  reedy  bank  as 
on  a  March  Brown  on  a  mountain  rapid. 

There  may  be  loafers  among  them,  and  others  per- 
chance may  be  finding  peace  from  a  scolding  wife, 
but  most,  no  doubt,  are  sportsmen  of  the  sort  inde- 
pendent of  crowds,  wages,  public-houses,  and  noise. 
But  of  such  perseverance  under  such  discouragement 
I  have  never  seen  anywhere  the  like.  At  the  old  mill 
of  Cleeve,  that  most  delectable  of  all  spots  upon  the 
Avon,  where  between  the  flowery  meads  and  lush 
hedgerows  of  Salford  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  bosky 
Marie  cliff  on  the  other,  the  river  with  some  assistance 
exhibits  every  kind  of  captivating  humour,  I  became 
by  chance  and  for  much  of  one  afternoon  a  witness 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  85 

to  the  patient  endeavours  of  half  a  dozen  well-ai-med 
and  prosperous  -  looking  anglers  down  for  the  day 
from  Birmingham.  Here  the  half -hours  sped  and  no 
sign  came  from  thorn  bush,  willow,  reed  bed,  or  mill 
bridge,  or  any  of  the  various  vantage  points  at  which 
the  several  members  possessed  themselves  in  patience 
and  isolation.  I  could  see  all  their  rods  projecting 
over  the  stream  and  pitching  anon  a  hook  re-baited 
with  a  fresh  worm  and  renewed  hope  into  the  water. 
Feeling  that  the  first  thrills  of  anticipation  were  well 
over,  I  ventured  to  approach  the  nearest  piscator,  as 
the  guide  -  book  would  designate  him,  an  elderly 
gentleman,  whom  I  had  long  since  assigned  to  the  legal 
profession,  and  asked  him  the  same  old  question  by 
way  merely  of  a  formula,  for  had  I  not  long  been 
the  lazy  witness  of  his  blighted  hopes.  On  receiving 
the  same  old  answer,  I  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  enjoyed 
any  sport  here.  He  shook  his  head  and  declared  that 
the  natives  caught  all  the  fish.  To  that  I  felt  justi- 
fied in  giving  a  warm  denial,  having  seen  the  natives 
fishing  by  the  hundred  and  with  no  less  futility  than 
himself.  "  Then,"  he  said,  "  I  give  it  up."  Not  the 
fishing,  for  I  am  sure  he  has  had  many  a  half-day  there 
from  Birmingham  since,  but  tlie  problem.  Yet  there 
they  are,  as  any  one  may  see  at  any  point,  sailing  com- 
placently across  the  stream — roach  and  dace  and  chub, 
and,  for  aught  I  know,  perch  and  bream  and  rudd, 
qualified,  I  should  say,  unless  I  have  been  the  victim 
of  some  gigantic  fantasy,  or  haunted  the  Avon  upon  a 
year  when  the  angler's  star  was  in  collision  with  every 
cross-current  in  the  firmament,  to  give  points  in  the 
matter  of  education  to  any  Itchen  trout.  The  Avon,  I 
might  add,  is  noted  for  the  quality  of  its  eels,  which 
fetch  the  top  price  in  the  London  market,  and  run  up 
from  the  tidal  Severn  when  every  miller  on  the  river 


86  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^  COUNTRY 

reckons   in   making    something    substantial    by   his 
traps. 

I  do  not  know  whether  that  famous  little  Severn 
eel,  the  lamprey,  comes  much  up  the  Avon.  But  the 
potted  lamprey,  of  which  Worcester  and  Gloucester 
make  a  speciality,  is  not  a  thing  to  be  passed  by,  as 
akin  to  potted  shrimp  or  salmon  as  we  understand 
them,  but  a  delicacy  of  altogether  another  order. 

It  is  difficult  to  understand  how  it  came  about  that 
the  destruction  of  this  bridge  at  Pershore  by  the 
Royalists,  after  Charles  the  First  crossed  it  on  his  retire- 
ment from  Oxford,  could  have  caused  such  a  loss  in 
human  life  as  Clarendon  and  the  local  annals  tell 
us  took  place  in  June  1644.  The  king,  who  had 
come  through  Cropthorne,  crossed  the  bridge  with 
6000  men  and  thirty  coaches  of  ladies  en  route  for 
Worcester.  In  destroying  it,  for  obvious  and  precau- 
tionary reasons,  workmen  and  others  to  the  number 
variously  stated,  but  given  by  Clarendon  as  high  as 
eighty,  were  crushed  or  drowned.  The  entry  to 
Pershore  is  in  keeping  with  its  generally  peaceful  and 
old-fashioned  air.  For  a  great  water-mill,  hardly 
venerable  nor  yet  on  the  other  hand  disturbingly 
modern  of  aspect,  fills  all  the  foreground  by  the  road- 
side and  strikes  a  singularly  appropriate  note  of  wel- 
come to  a  town  of  wholly  monastic  origin  and  traditions. 

The  Avon  surges  out  to  the  margin  of  the  road  from 
beneath  the  mill  with  fine  commotion,  and  spreads 
itself  in  a  wide  and  noble  basin  of  froth  and  foam 
flake  and  streaming,  gravelly  shallow.  To  those  of  us 
who  by  association  and  habit  are  hopelessly  com- 
mitted to  the  mountain  or  even  the  chalk  stream,  and 
are  constitutionally  incapable  of  seeing  eye  to  eye 
with  the  Midlander,  the  East  Anglian,  or  the  prophet 
of  the  sluggish  stream,  the  Avon  is  constantly  uttering. 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  S7 

as  it  were,  protests  and  not  wholly  ineffective  ones. 
If  any  sluggish  river  can  soften  the  northern  or  western 
heart  it  is  Shakespeare's  Avon.  For  just  as  you  are 
wearying  a  little  of  the  even  and  uneventful  tide, 
comes  in  the  nick  of  time  one  of  those  delightful  inter- 
ludes, man-made  though  they  be.  These  pleasant  scenes 
of  mellow  brick  mill,  and  froth,  and  old  stone  weir, 
and  ancient-paved  ford,  and  spreading  foliage  have  a 
character  of  their  own,  which  might,  as  I  have  said, 
almost  soften  the  heart  of  a  Welshman  or  a  Scot. 
The  Avon,  too,  might  fairly  put  forward  in  extenua- 
tion of  a  muddy  bottom  or  lack  of  clarity  that  her 
Elizabethan  owners,  who  first  made  her  navigable 
and  dammed  her  natural  tides  and  erected  locks,  have 
much  to  answer  for  in  this  respect.  For  there  is  no 
saying  with  what  vivacity  she  might  have  sped  in 
ancient  times  over  a  clean  and  gravelly  bed,  though 
neither  trout  nor  salmon  we  know  would  ever  have 
anything  to  say  to  her,  which  is  significant. 

Pershore  is  in  appearance  everything  that  it  should 
be,  for  an  ancient  little  town  that  concerns  itself 
chiefly  with  distributing  the  produce  of  orchards  and 
in  exhibiting  the  beautiful  remains  of  the  abbey, 
which  in  ."^im  ages  gave  it  birth.  A  single  wide  and 
long  street  accounts  for  most  of  it.  It  is  a  place 
architecturally  typical  of  this  west  midland  district 
that  lies  between  the  Cotswolds  stone  country  and  the 
industrial  modernity  that  has  extinguished  the  flavour 
of  the  past,  if  not  all  details  of  it,  in  north  Worcester- 
shire. A  pleasant,  sleepy,  Georgian  flavour  greets 
you  at  the  "  Utterance  ",  as  the  ancients  have  it,  and 
as  it  trails  away  northward  towards  the  Worcester 
road  its  humbler  half  remains  inoffensive  and  un- 
obtrusive, while  a  wide,  square  midway  opens  towards 
the  abbey,  otherwise  the  parish  church  and  its  bowery 


88  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

precincts.  A  hostelry  of  ample  proportions,  of  Quarter 
Sessions,  coaching  and  assembly  room  complexion, 
but  of  neither  Tudor  architecture  nor  yet  up-to-date 
assertiveness  at  the  very  heart  of  the  town  leaves  you 
no  shadow  of  a  doubt  as  to  where  you  should  sleep 
or  lunch.  Such  is  Pershore.  The  local  antiquarian, 
I  am  quite  sure,  could  take  you  behind  many  of 
these  sedate  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  century  fronts 
and  show  you  an  oak  staircase  here,  or  an  escutcheon 
there  of  ancient  memory.  But  we  cannot  afford  here 
to  be  so  meticulous.  The  Abbey  Church  is  Pershore, 
so  far  as  we  and  practically  all  other  visitors  are 
concerned. 

Less  fortunate  than  Tewkesbury,  all  that  has  been 
left  by  the  smashers  and  plunderers  at  the  Dissolution 
of  the  Church  of  the  great  Benedictine  House  of 
Pershore,  is  the  tower,  choir,  and  south  transept. 
But  even  this  remnant  of  a  building,  the  vanished 
nave  of  which  was  i8o  feet  long,  provides  a  parish 
church  of  dimensions,  dignity,  and  beauty  such  as  is 
given  to  few  country  towns  for  public  worship.  For 
the  choir  is  a  most  beautiful  and  uplifting  specimen 
of  Early  English,  the  pointed  arches  of  its  bays  spring- 
ing from  clustered  columns  with  floriated  capitals, 
while  the  triforium  and  clerestory  are  associated  in 
a  manner  most  curious  and,  I  imagine,  almost  unique 
in  this  country.  The  roof  is  vaulted  and  enriched 
with  floriated  bosses  of  the  Decorated  period.  The 
choir,  like  the  nave,  was  originally  Norman  but  was 
destroyed  by  fire  early  in  the  thirteenth  century 
and  rebuilt  as  we  see  it  now.  The  massive  lantern 
tower,  Norman  in  its  lower  half,  is  otherwise  fourteenth 
century,  and  its  interior,  as  seen  from  below,  with  its 
arcaded  panels  and  carved  string  courses,  is  most 
effective,  and  generally  held  to  be  only  matched  at 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  89 

Lincoln.  Sir  Gilbert  Scott,  who  did  the  necessary 
restoration  here  nearly  fifty  years  ago,  believed  it  to  be 
the  work  of  the  same  hand  that  built  the  tower  of 
Salisbury  Cathedral.  The  north  transept  was  spared 
by  the  Dissolution  ravagers,  or  rather  was  purchased 
from  them,  but  fell  down  in  the  following  century. 
The  lady  chapel  and  the  other  chapels  were  also 
destroyed  and  the  materials  sold  by  the  same  hands. 
All  that  remains  of  the  original  Norman  building  is 
the  lofty  south  transept  opening  out  of  the  tower 
space,  in  which  there  is  some  good  and  characteristic 
Norman  work  and  one  or  two  monuments  of  interest. 
Externally  this  Abbey  Church  of  the  Holy  Cross  is  well 
placed,  like  Tewkesbury  and  Evesham,  in  awell-ordered 
and  well-timbered  graveyard,  abutting  on  the  west  end 
of  the  little  town  and  opening  out  into  the  country. 
I  have  spoken  of  it  as  the  parish  church, but  immediately 
adjacent,  across  a  lane,  is  the  small  but  ancient  fabric 
of  St.  Andrews,  a  rather  grim,  but  interesting,  little 
building  of  mainly  thirteenth  century  work,  grafted  on 
an  earlier  Norman  church. 

Though  of  more  ancient  origin  Pershore  Abbey 
came  into  the  front  rank  as  a  Benedictine  House  in 
the  tenth  century.  That  Earl  Odda,  whose  name,  as 
supposed,[is  graven  on  the  Saxon  chapel  at  Deerhurst, 
according  to  "  Domesday  ",  was  a  great  benefactor  to 
Pershore  just  before  the  Conquest.  Heavily  endowed 
by  Saxon  kings  and  nobles  it  was  hit  hard,  like  its  great 
neighbour  of  Worcester,  Tewkesbury,  and  Evesham, 
by  the  heavy  toll  which  Edward  the  Confessor  put  on 
its  possessions  for  his  new  Abbey  of  Westminster. 
"  Robbery  "  was  the  word  used  by  all  the  abbots  and 
monks  of  Worcestershire,  and  for  centuries  afterwards. 
Till  the  Dissolution  the  wide  interests  possessed  by 
Westminster  in  this  part  of  England  were  the  cause 


90    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of  much  heart-burning  to  the  local  monasteries  and 
indeed  of  no  little  friction.  They  had  little  enough 
love  for  one  another,  and  the  flame  of  mutual  jealousy 
burned  strong  within  them.  But  they  all  hated 
Westminster  with  a  tenfold  greater  hatred,  not  only  as 
enjoying  lands  which  they  considered  had  been  filched 
from  themselves,  but  as  a  local  everywhere  and  in 
every  sphere  of  life  hates  an  outsider.  There  was 
occasionally  even  better  reason  than  this,  for  it  appears 
that  in  Edward  the  Second's  time  the  Pope  sent  his 
nuncio  to  seize  goods  and  crops  in  Pershore  for  a  debt 
owed  him  by  the  Abbot  of  Westminster.  The  king, 
on  being  appealed  to,  was  indignant,  more  for  his  own 
pride's  sake  than  for  that  of  the  abbot's  chattels, 
and  sent  his  own  men  there  just  in  time.  But  even 
then  the  nuncio's  thunders  of  excommunication 
roared  so  loudly  in  Pershore  that  a  somewhat  humiliat- 
ing compromise  was  submitted  to.  The  Abbot  of 
Pershore  was  summoned  occasionally  to  Parliament, 
and  the  abbey  was  the  third  in  wealth  of  the  great 
Worcestershire  houses,  being  possessed  of  about  half 
the  revenue  enjoyed  respectively  by  Worcester  and 
Evesham.  The  temporalities  of  the  Church  in  pre- 
Reformation  Worcestershire  were  in  greater  proportion 
to  lay  property  than  in  any  shire  of  England,  while, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  had  not  been  a  land  of  great 
things  before  the  Conquest,  nor  was  it  one  of  great 
barons  afterwards,  like  its  neighbours  on  both  sides. 
It  may  be  worth  noting,  moreover,  that  the  little 
church  of  St.  Andrew,  already  alluded  to,  was  originally 
erected  by  Edward  the  Confessor  for  his  abbey  tenants 
in  the  manor  of  Pershore.  The  Church  not  only  held 
proportionately  more  land  here  than  in  any  other 
county,  but  such  lay  lords  as  there  were  in  Worcester- 
shire in  the  Middle  Ages  were  mainly  absentees.    The 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  91 

county  was  more  than  commonly  forested,  population 
proportionately  thin.  But  the  Church,  including  a 
great  and  powerful  bishopric,  was  wealthy  and 
splendid.  The  Avon  region  was  probably  the  most 
open  and  populous  part  of  the  county,  and  here,  close 
together  on  its  banks  as  deadly  rivals,  were  two  of  its 
three  great  monasteries,  to  say  nothing  of  Tewkesbury 
on  the  verge  of  the  county.  For  those  of  Great  and 
Little  Malvern,  Bordesley  and  others  were  much  smaller. 
No  other  river  in  England  possessed  three  monasteries 
of  the  first  rank  within  fifteen  miles  of  one  another. 
Worcestershire,  not  being  one  of  those  counties  that 
have  been  written  and  talked  into  quite  dispropor- 
tionate pre-eminence  among  their  fellows,  it  will 
probably  surprise  even  most  lovers  of  the  past  to  be 
reminded  that  both  Freeman  and  Creighton  have 
declared  it  to  be  in  many  historical  respects  the  most 
interesting  county  in  England. 

It  can  be  well  imagined  what  a  cataclysm  the 
Dissolution  proved  to  such  a  region.  The  monastery 
of  Pershore,  like  that  of  Tewkesbury,  fell  at  once  into 
obscure  and  sordid  ownership.  Like  the  rest  of  them, 
its  beautiful  buildings  became  a  stone  quarry  for  the 
benefit  of  insignificant  and  undeserving  pockets,  and 
as  at  Tewkesburj'  the  townspeople  appear  only  to 
have  saved  this  remnant  of  their  church  by  putting 
their  hands  in  their  own,  and  paying  blackmail.  One 
reason  for  the  vigour  with  which  the  great  Saxon 
monasteries  in  these  parts,  including  Westminster, 
which  had  40,000  acres  in  the  county,  survived  the 
Norman  Conquest  was  the  outstanding  personality 
of  the  famous  Saxon  bishop  Wulfstan  of  Worcester, 
almost  alone  of  his  nation,  and  to  a  far  greater  extent 
than  any  other  cleric  among  them  retained  place  and 
power,  winning  the  confidence  of  the  Conqueror,  and 


92  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

the  high  esteem  of  his  ecclesiastical  lieutenant, 
Langfranc.  William,  moreover,  favoured  the  existence 
of  Church  feudatories  within  touch  of  the  Welsh 
borders.  Their  hatred,  amply  reciprocated,  of  the 
Welsh  Church,  still  independent  of  Canterbury,  was 
one  strong  recommendation,  and  their  peaceful 
character  as  regards  the  Crown  a  still  stronger  one. 
The  Reformation,  which  put  a  succession  of 
chatelaines  into  the  Episcopal  castle  of  Hartlebury, 
may  well  on  occasions  have  caused  both  the  clergy 
and  laity  of  the  diocese  to  doubt  whether  the  bishop 
as  a  domestic  character  was  always  a  credit  to  the  new 
system,  and  a  shining  example  to  the  family  life  of 
his  diocese.  That  indefatigable  local  antiquary,  the 
late  Mr.  Noaks,  has  transcribed  from  the  records  of 
the  House  of  Lords  the  performances  of  Bishop 
Thornburgh,  who  held  the  See  of  Worcester  for  a 
long  period  anterior  to  the  Civil  War.  These  are 
nothing  less  than  scandalous,  and  suggest  the  con- 
nived-at  machinations  of  an  unscrupulous  match- 
making wife  and  a  family  lost  to  all  sense  of  decency, 
but  prodigiously  alive  to  the  main  chance.  The 
kidnapping  of  heiresses  went  merrily  on,  along  the 
Welsh  border,  while  in  Ireland  we  know  it  was  a 
recognized  form  of  enterprise  in  the  seventeenth  and 
early  eighteenth  century  among  the  squireens.  In  the 
bishop's  case,  it  is  true,  there  was  no  midnight  raid 
nor  hedge  priest  to  offer  the  best  of  two  sorry  alterna- 
tives to  the  victim.  But  the  motives  were  the  same, 
and  the  procedure  in  a  manner  worse.  Bishop 
Thornburgh  came  on  from  Bristol  in  1610,  and  reigned 
at  Worcester  nearly  thirty  years.  He  was  of  the 
Puritan  school,  and  quarrelled  with  his  deans,  who 
were  mostly  for  orderly  ritual  and  the  decencies  of 
cathedral    ceremonial.     The    bishop    stored    his    hay 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  93 

in  consecrated  buildings,  encouraged  informal  gather- 
ings  who    discussed    theology,  read    Scripture   aloud 
to  one  another,  walked    about,  and    even  kept  their 
hats  on  at  the  west  end   of  the  cathedral  while  the 
choir  and    canons  were  chanting  the  service  at  the 
other.     He  put  his  near  relatives  into  the  best  things 
in  his  gift,  and  even  met  the  nominations  of  the  Crown 
for  such  appointments  by  the  candid  objection  that 
he  had  already  bestowed  them  on  a  son  or  a  nephew. 
But  these  things  were  done  by  many  bishops,  and 
till  a  much  later  date.     Not   even  an   Anglo-Welsh 
prelate  of  the  eighteenth  and  early  nineteenth  century, 
however,  would  have  ventured  to  improve  the  family 
fortunes  by  kidnapping  wealthy  minors  of  both  sexes. 
For  towards  the  close  of  his  career,  the  bishop's  son 
Thomas  abducted    a    co-heiress  of  the  Acton  estate 
in  the  neighbourhood,  aged  fifteen,  from  her  mother's 
house,    and   with     the    connivance    of    his   lordship 
detained  her  for  six  weeks  in  the  palace,  and  then 
with  his  pious  father's  further  assistance  married  her. 
She  had  £4000  which,  in  course  of  time,  the  bishop 
persuaded    her  to   apply   to   the   liquidation   of    his 
scapegrace  son's  debts.     Soon  afterwards,  she  affirms 
in  her  suit,  he  turned  her  out  of  doors  with  her  children, 
as  she  refused  to  continue  relations  with  a  husband 
who  was  obviously  a  proper  scoundrel,  and  for  good 
reasons.      She    sued    and   obtained   alimony  of    15s. 
a    week,    which    these    clerical    financial    operators, 
Bishop    &    Son,  never   paid.     They  were   ultimately 
compelled  to  refund  £180,  which  virtually  finished  a 
most  scandalous  business.     Twenty  years  later,  poor 
Dame  Thornburgh  was  apparently  making  her  living 
by  needlework,  and  in  a  petition  to  the  Crown  described 
herself  as  co-heiress  of  Sir  Thomas  Acton,  but  ruined 
in  fortune  by  her  marriage  to  the  bishop's  son.     Lest 


94    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARF/S  COUNTRY 

it  might  be  deemed  that  some  inconceivable  malignity 
had  succeeded  in  representing  the  Episcopal  household 
as  other  than  they  were,  a  further  petition  appears 
in  the  same  records  from  Sir  R.  Willoughby,  to  the 
effect  that,  when  he  was  only  fourteen  years  of  age, 
he  had  been  cajoled  into  marrying  the  bishop's 
daughter  Elizabeth.  Furthermore,  that  by  the  deceit 
of  his  wife  and  her  family,  he  had  been  defrauded  of 
the  manor  of  Turner's  Puddle,  in  Dorsetshire.  The 
said  wife  had  long  deserted  him,  and  lived  as  a  nun 
abroad,  but  now,  having  broken  her  vow,  was  living 
riotously.  The  knight  prays  that  the  rents  of  the 
manor  may  in  future  be  paid  to  himself. 

Pershore,  throughout  the  Civil  War,  was  in  the 
heart  of  the  fighting  zone.  It  was  not  fortified  like 
Evesham  or  Worcester,  but,  like  Tewkesbury  and 
many  other  of  the  open  towns  in  these  parts,  was 
under  a  Royalist  Governor.  The  one  here  was  Sir 
Walter  Pye  of  Kilpeck,  in  Herefordshire.  Now  Sir 
Walter,  so  far  as  my  reading  of  the  Civil  Wars  has 
served  me,  had  no  particular  military  talents,  but  I 
was  glad  of  the  excuse  to  take  off  my  hat  to  the 
memory  of  a  man  and  of  a  family  who  unostentatiously, 
and  without  any  stimulating  prestige  of  name  or 
lineage,  risked  their  lives  and  sacrificed  the  whole 
of  their  recently  acquired  wealth  in  behalf  of  two  not 
over-worthy  kings.  For  the  Pyes  were  virtually  new 
people,  Sir  Walter's  father  having  made  a  great 
fortune  in  trade.  I  never  pass  the  brushy  tump  where 
once  stood  Kilpeck  Castle,  with  its  perfect  little 
Norman  church  near  by,  which  the  trader  Pye  bought 
from  the  Earls  of  Ormond,  without  a  thought  of  that 
strange  shortlived  family  story  which  tells  of  a 
fortune,  said  to  reach  the  enormous  sum  of  £25,000 
a  year,  dissipated  in  two  generations  in  a  fashion  so 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  95 

curiously  unselfish.  At  any  rate,  Sir  Walter,  the 
son,  was  for  some  time  in  command  at  Pershore,  and 
though  in  this  connexion  he  merely  did  as  hundreds 
more,  new  squires  and  old,  his  son  again  performed 
the  much  more  single-minded,  if  less  sane,  act  of  self- 
sacrifice  in  adhering  to  James  II  and  dying  with 
nothing  to  his  name  but  the  empty  title  of  Baron 
Kilpeck. 

Pershore  was  the  head-quarters  of  Essex  when 
that  first  disastrous  skirmish  was  fought  at  Powick 
Bridge  by  the  raw  troopers  of  his  advance  guard. 
Through  Pershore,  too,  came  Charles  in  1643  after  the 
fatal  error,  as  it  proved,  of  the  unsuccessful  siege  of 
Gloucester.  He  was  racing  Essex  and  his  army  of 
London  apprentices  back  to  the  capital,  a  race  in 
which  it  will  be  remembered  he  was  by  just  so  much 
to  the  good  at  Newbury  as  to  then  block  the  road 
to  London,  but  only  to  fight  a  drawn  battle  which 
failed  to  stop  the  earl  and  his  Londoners.  The 
Royalists,  who  rode  with  Charles  over  Pershore 
Bridge  that  September  day,  could  not  have  had 
pleasant  thoughts.  They  were  not  of  the  kind,  to  be 
sure,  which  must  have  depressed  them  a  year  later, 
when  they  broke  down  the  bridge  ;  by  no  means 
even  then  despairing  ones,  but  nevertheless  by  that 
time  they  had  become  accustomed  to  view  the  future 
with  the  gravest  doubt.  But  on  this  earlier  visit  to 
Pershore,  sanguine  hopes  of  finishing  the  whole 
business  with  a  combined  victorious  march  on  London 
had  been  general  and  justifiable.  Two  things  had  just 
occurred,  however,  which  had  cruelly  reversed  the 
prospect,  though  not,  of  course,  quite  so  obviously  to 
the  high  couraged  men  then  on  the  way,  as  it  turned 
out,  to  Newbury  field.  Nor  could  they  know  that 
what  was  to  prove  the  turning-point  of  the  war  had 


96  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

just  been  passed,  or  that  their  chance  was  gone. 
But  still  they  were  sufficiently  conscious  of  a  great 
opportunity  lost,  and  of  other  unexpected  develop- 
ments, to  give  food  enough  for  reflection  to  any  that 
were  capable  of  it. 

For  Gloucester,  the  one  great  stronghold  of  Parlia- 
ment in  the  west,  had  baffled  them  with  a  heroism 
unmatched  in  any  siege  of  the  war.  It  had  delayed 
them  a  month  and  that  too  for  nothing,  while  a 
strong  opinion  obtained  that  there  had  been  no 
occasion  to  waste  even  a  valuable  week  over  it.  The 
other  less  obvious  misfortune,  but  scarcely  less  signi- 
ficant, lay  in  the  fact  that  Essex  had  raised  an  army 
of  London  apprentices  capable  of  marching  across 
England  to  the  relief  of  Gloucester  and  defying  the 
efforts  of  Rupert's  cavalry  to  check  them,  even  on  the 
open  sweeps  of  the  Cotswolds.  They  were  now  on 
the  way  to  fight  that  same  raw  army  in  more  decisive 
and  regular  fashion,  and  to  experience  more  fully  and 
yet  more  unexpectedly  what  mettle  it  was  made  of. 
Falkland  was  of  course  at  Pershore  with  the  king  on 
this  occasion ;  the  peace  that  he  so  ardently  longed 
for  and  quite  looked  for  in  an  expected  victory  pushed 
far  into  the  background  ;  the  death  that  his  noble 
spirit,  rent  by  the  distractions  of  his  beloved  country, 
courted,  now  close  at  hand. 

The  course  of  the  Avon  has  so  far  had  such  a  north- 
ward trend,  that  a  fine  broad  highway  will  take  you 
from  Pershore  to  Worcester  in  about  eight  miles. 
Pershore,  it  may  be  said,  possesses  itself  in  all  seeming 
patience  a  good  mile  and  a  half  from  its  railway 
station  on  the  G.W.R.  main  line.  Many  towns  of 
greater  importance  are  almost  as  unfortunate,  from 
the  mere  terror  which  the  early  Victorian  burgher 
cultivated  of  the  primitive  locomotive  at  close  quarters. 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  97 

After  all,  if  you  had  been  accustomed  to  drive  from 
say  Rugby  to  London,  it  is  quite  probable  that  the 
situation  of  the  local  station  to  a  mile  or  two  seemed 
a  matter  of  perfect  indifference,  so  great  was  the 
saving  of  time  in  any  case,  while  its  demoralizing 
possibilities  loomed  immense.  It  seems  probable, 
however,  that  Pershore  owes  its  aloofness  not  to  these 
primitive  tremors  of  the  men  of  old  time,  but  to  the  final 
loop  which  the  river  describes  to  the  northward,  thereby 
forbidding  any  attempt  at  greater  familiarity  on  the 
part  of  the  best  intentioned  line  from  Evesham  to 
Worcester.  After  this  the  Avon  valley  assumes  its 
normally  north-eastward  inclination.  You  may  follow 
it  to  Evesham  on  either  edge  of  the  widish  meadows 
through  which  the  river  makes  its  8-like  curves.  But 
much  better  than  the  rather  dull  main  road  on  the 
eastern  bank,  or  even  the  reasonably  interesting  one 
on  the  other,  would  be  a  walk  by  lanes  or  footpaths 
through  the  three  villages  between  here  and  Evesham, 
by  Wick  and  Cropthorne,  that  is  to  say,  and  over  the 
river  to  Fladbury.  All  three  stand  for  everything 
that  makes  the  villages  of  the  Avon  contribute  as 
much  to  its  charm  as  the  Avon  contributes  to  that 
of  its  villages.  The  last  two  stand  out  with  Bredon 
as  worthier  of  notice  perhaps  than  any  of  their  fellows 
between  Tewkesbury  and  Stratford.  Wick  has  no 
such  reputation,  but  it  struck  me  as  over-modest  or 
overlooked  by  fame  and  admirably  typical,  which 
means  something  in  this  country  of  delightful  villages. 
It  is,  to  be  sure,  but  a  long  string  of  cottages,  many 
of  them  half  timbered,  standing  apart  in  gardens  that 
bloom  with  the  luxuriance  which  belongs  to  a  rich 
soil  in  a  country  of  born  gardeners.  But  the  little 
church  is  worth  a  visit,  with  the  village  cross  standing 
in  a  pasture  field  beside  it.  Very  ancient,  beyond 
7 


98  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

question,  and  of  Early  English  character  in  the  main, 
it  contains  a  chancel,  a  nave  of  three  bays,  a  modern 
north  aisle,  and  a  belfry. 

With  apologies  for  a  brief  excursion  into  things 
material  I  should  greatly  like  to  know  why  a  vicarage 
was  erected  quite  recently  here  at  the  expense  of  the 
Ecclesiastical  Commissioners  at  a  cost  of  £1700  for  a 
gentleman  in  receipt  of  an  official  income  of  £170 
per  annum.  The  fact  would  not  of  course  be  worth 
mentioning  if  this  method  did  not  prevail  all  over 
England.  Private  means,  one  may  fairly  assume,  cannot 
be  taken  for  granted  nowadays  in  striking  an  average 
for  the  future  church  incumbent.  The  vicarage  looks 
an  altogether  desirable  haven,  but  that  has  nothing  to 
do  with  the  question.  Just  conceive  building  a  house, 
the  economic  rental  of  which  would  be  nearly  one 
hundred  pounds  a  year,  for  future  occupants  enjoying 
a  stipend  of  much  less  than  twice  that  sum. 

Surely  an  eight  hundred  pound  house  and  another 
forty  to  the  stipend  would  be  a  more  sane  proceeding. 
Why  should  a  parson  be  saddled  with  a  house  of  about 
thrice  the  value  that  any  other  man  with  the  same 
income  would  elect  to  inhabit  ?  Surely  the  much- 
tried  country  clergy  have  had  enough  of  over-housing, 
for  which  in  the  past  there  was  more  excuse.  More- 
over, a  layman  of  small  means  may  be  socially  sensitive 
about  the  scale  of  his  house,  or  even  professionally 
affected  by  it.  But  a  parson  is  quite  independent 
of  all  such  vulgar  assessments,  and  his  wife  might 
fearlessly  administer  an  establishment  adapted  to 
an  income  of  two  or  three  hundred  a  year  without 
any  thought  for  a  censorious  world. 

A  pleasant  walk  of  a  couple  of  miles  up  the  valley 
skirting  the  meadows  lands  one  at  Cropthorne,  which 
is  deservedly  of  more  note  than  Wick.     The  village 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  99 

alone,  standing  upon  the  slope  and  summit  of  a  low 
ridge  looking  over  the  Avon  valley,  has  a  goodly  share 
of  ancient  cottages,  half  timbered  or  stone,  thatched 
or  flagged.     Many  of  them  are  well  poised  amid  a  gay 
confusion  of  the  flowers  and  fruits  of  the  earth,  upon 
slopes  above  the  winding  road.     One  or  two  of  greater 
pretension  thrust  out  well-furbished  Tudor  fronts  and 
carved    oak    barge  boards   upon   the   highway,    with 
pleasant  and  harmonious  accessories  which  proclaim 
them  quite  obviously  the    haunts  of  what  are  some- 
times   comprehensively    entitled    the    village    gentry. 
Through  all  these  is  a  pleasant  flavour  of  fruit  trees,  in 
August,  during  which  month  Cropthorne  comes  most 
readily  back  to  me,  showing  a  fat  promise  of  apple, 
pear,  and  plum.     Over  all,  too,  there  is  a  soothing 
whisper  of  elm  leaves  and  sharp  lines  of  shade  and 
sunlight  that  always  seem  to  me  to  glorify  black  and 
white  architecture  above  all  other  styles.     At  the  head 
of  the  village,  standing,  as  is  meet  and  right,  side  by 
side,  are  the  church  and  the  hall  with  a  fine  outlook 
beyond  over  the  valley  to  Fladbury  and  the  Duke  of 
Orleans'   richly  timbered  uplands  at   Wood  Norton. 
The  hall,  though  I  fancy  of  respectable  age  and  associa- 
tions, is  of  no  special  interest  ;  Charlton,  the  old  manor 
house  of  the  famous  but  extinct  Worcestershire  family  of 
Dinely,  being  the  historic  mansion  of  the  parish,  though 
very  largely  rebuilt.     The  church  consists  of  a  pinnacled 
tower,  nave,  aisles,  and  a  rebuilt  chancel  with  clerestory, 
and  a  double  arcade  of  Norman  arches,  while  the  pews 
are  of  carved  oak  of  the  seventeenth  century.     The 
most  interesting  features  of  the  interior,  however,  are 
the  Dinely  (or  Dingley)  monuments.      The  different 
versions  of  its   name,  in   which  this  famous   family 
apparently  acquiesced  and  even  encouraged  by  its  loose 
methods  of  signature,  is  disconcerting  to  all  Worcester- 


lOO  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

shire  historians.  At  any  rate,  it  seems  pretty  certain 
that  when  they  disappeared  in  the  beginning  of  the 
eighteenth  century  they  were  as  far  as  ever  from  a  settle- 
ment. Of  course  nobody  cared  two  straws  about 
spelHng  till  quite  recently.  There  wasn't  such  a  thing. 
A  person  of  condition  would  often  write  his  own  name 
in  two  or  three  different  ways  on  the  same  page,  not  from 
illiteracy,  for  he  may  have  been  a  good  scholar,  but  with 
deliberate  contempt  for  anything  but  its  proper  sound. 
Yet  Aunt  Maria,  that  amiable  dragon  of  heraldic  and 
genealogical  mythology,  whose  shade  we  have  before 
invoked,  will  tell  you  her  branch  of  the  Smythes  always 
used  the  final  "e",  and  were  always  of  course  Smythes  ! 
Dear  innocent  creature,  long  may  she  flourish  !  But 
the  Dinelys,  or  Dingleys,  overstepped  phonetic  prin- 
ciples in  their  free-and-easiness,  and,  as  I  remarked, 
vanished  from  the  earth's  stage  before  they  could  be 
induced  to  settle  a  question  that  has  troubled  the 
local  historian  ever  since,  merely,  that  is  to  say,  to  the 
extent  of  conscientiously  recording  their  many  acts 
as  performed  by  "  Francis  Dingley  (or  Dinely)  by  Sir 
Edward  Dinely  (or  Dingley)."  And  this  is  a  pity,  as 
it  suggests  the  idea  of  their  being  shadowy  characters, 
instead  of  for  the  most  part  strenuous  ones,  a  little  more 
indifferent  than  common  to  orthography.  The  gorgeous 
monument  to  Francis  Dingley  (or  Dinely)  of  date  1624, 
where  he  and  his  lady  lie  in  resplendent  effigy,  sup- 
ported by  nineteen  children,  some  of  the  latter  with 
cradles,  emblematical  of  their  brief  stay  at  Charlton, 
will  surely  delight  the  visitor.  Another  canopy  covers 
the  effigies  of  the  next  squire,  Edward  Dinely  (or 
Dingley),  and  his  lady,  kneeling  face  to  face,  a  praying- 
desk  between  them.  Only  seven  children,  four  boys, 
or  men  rather,  on  the  one  side,  and  three  girls  on  the 
other,  kneel  here  below.     All  these  monuments  and 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  loi 

effigies  are  coloured  and  well  preserved,  and  an  effort  at 
portraiture  is  obvious,  particularly  in  this  last  one. 

This  Edward  Dinely  died  at  the  close  of  the  Civil 
War,  during  which  the  Dinelys  took  a  leading  part, 
politically,  at  any  rate,  on  the  side  of  the  Parliament, 
together  with  the  Logons,  the  Salweys,  and  three  or 
four  other  leading  Worcestershire  families. 

Edward  Dinely  was  one  of  the  sequestrators  for  the 
county,  and  one  can  hardly  fancy  that  for  him  social 
life  can  have  been  worth  living,  even  after  the  peace,  in 
such  a  hotbed  of  Royalist  ardour.  But  one  of  them,  the 
foremost  of  the  filial  procession  upon  the  tomb,  I  take 
it,  played  a  disinterested  and  courageous  part.  For 
when  the  country  people  of  this  district,  as  in  others  of 
the  more  war-wracked  regions,  rose  in  despair  against 
the  indiscriminate  pillaging  and  exactions  of  both 
sides,  under  the  name  of  Club-men,  Dinely  headed 
2000  of  them  who  had  assembled  on  Bredon  Hill, 
and  made  a  hopeless  effort  to  prevent  Rupert,  with 
some  of  his  cavalry,  crossing  the  Cotswolds,  only  to  be 
brushed  aside  like  chaff. 

But  another  of  these,  Thomas  Dinely,  interested  me 
much  more,  as  an  old  friend,  who  had  provided  me  with 
no  little  entertainment  at  a  not  remote  period  in  the 
more  peaceful  paths  of  literature.  It  was  not  his 
"History  in  Marble",  by  which  he  lives,  if  the  recorded 
fact  of  such  a  book  in  catalogues  and  a  brief  allusion 
to  it  in  the  local  guide-book  can  be  called  immortality, 
that  so  delighted  me,  but  a  quite  whimsical  MS. 
account  of  a  progress  through  Wales  of  the  Duke  of 
Beaufort  as  President  of  the  Marches,  illustrated  by 
the  author  and  not  long  ago  printed  to  the  extent  of  a 
few  copies.  Thomas  Dinely  went  in  the  suite  of 
the  duke,  and  with  engaging  naivete  and  a  great  deal 
of  unconscious  humour — for  he  was  himself  an  anti- 


M^^^f. 


I02  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

quarian — describes  for  us  the  enthusiastic  loyalty  and 
hospitality  of  the  South  and  West  Walians,  and  the 
touching  reverence  they  entertained  for  the  august 
person  of  his  own  patron  the  duke.  He  tells  us  how 
the  gutters  of  Carmarthen  ran  claret,  how  the  dying 
embers  of  the  bonfires  in  the  streets  were  rekindled 
in  the  small  hours  by  the  cloaks  and  hats  and  canes 
flung  on  them  by  enthusiastic  and  over-merry  revellers. 
He  tells  us  how  excellent  was  the  claret  of  the  Cardigan- 
shire squires,  and  how  admirably  they  mixed  punch, 
and  a  great  many  other  things  that  illuminate  a 
country  at  a  period  when  we  know  very  little  of 
it,  except  through  the  medium  of  Nonconformist 
biographies  and  autobiographies,  which  relate  how  the 
souls  of  the  once  light-hearted  and  frivolous  Welshmen 
were  saved,  and  the  common  people  gradually  prepared 
for  the  extraordinary  change  that  has  come  over  them. 
The  expedition  started  from  Worcester,  and  Thomas 
Dinely  of  Charlton,  in  Cropthorne,  as  a  Worcestershire 
man,  was  within  the  jurisdiction  of  Wales  and  the 
Marches,  which  was  then  almost  at  its  close,  and  I  think 
he  was  a  minor  official  of  the  Ludlow  court.  It  is 
singular  how  rarely  the  lights  of  Shakespearean  topog- 
raphy, searching  after  the  minutest  contemporary 
facts  and  details,  seem  to  realize  or  at  least  to  vouch- 
safe their  readers  the  information  that  Shakespeare 
lived  within  three  miles  of  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
President  of  Wales  and  the  Marches.  In  his  day,  too, 
it  was  much  more  of  a  reality  than  in  Thomas  Dinely's. 
Worcestershire,  to  be  sure,  by  no  means  relished  its 
inclusion  and  constantly  petitioned  against  it,  though 
it  had  the  great  saving  merit  of  sparing  a  litigant  the 
expense  of  a  journey  to  London,  for  Ludlow  was  but 
a  step.  With  the  Stuarts  it  came  to  be  an  engine  of 
oppression  and  was  known  as  the  Star  Chamber  of 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  103 

Wales.  "  From  Ludlow  and  the  Court  of  the  Marches, 
good  Lord  deliver  us  "  was  an  invocation  frequently 
pronounced  on  the  banks  of  the  Severn  and  Avon. 
More  old  friends  rose  to  mind  as  I  gazed  upon  these 
silent  groups  of  prolific  Dinelys  (or  Dingleys).  For  with 
all  their  fertility  they  were  reduced  to  a  solitary  girl 
by  about  1740,  who  carried  away  the  property  to  one 
Edward  Goodere  (or  Goodyear) — so  little  did  they  care 
for  a  few  odd  letters — of  Burghope,  a  rather  eccentric 
and  choleric  knight  of  Herefordshire.  But  his  choler 
and  peculiarities  are  of  purely  local  and  Herefordian 
significance,  so  I  must  not  drag  them  in.  But  his  sons, 
Dinelys  in  the  female  line,  made  England  ring,  even 
in  the  absence  of  halfpenny  newspapers,  with  a  tragedy 
in  high  life.  For  the  Squire  of  Burghope  was  a  childless 
man,  and  his  brother  (or  cousin),  who  commanded  a  ship 
ofwar,  H.M.S.  "Ruby",  was  his  next  heir.  It  was  when 
the  "  Ruby  "  lay  in  Bristol  that  its  captain  saw  his 
opportunity.  For,  inviting  his  brother  on  board,  he 
nefariously  made  away  with  him.  It  was  clumsily 
done,  with  the  aid  of  accomplices  who  gave  their 
employer  away,  and  he  was  hung  at  Bristol.  So  ended, 
I  think,  a  line  who  came  originally,  so  one  of  the  monu- 
ments at  Cropthorne  tells  us,  of  noble  origin  in  the 
north,  probably  Cheshire,  and  were  men  of  action, 
if  not  always  of  great  actions,  to  the  bitter  end. 

Charlton,  their  old  abode,  is  on  the  same  side  of  the 
river  and  beyond  the  church.  Samuel  Foote,  the  cele- 
brated comedian,  seems  to  have  been  in  some  sort 
heir  to  the  ill-fated  Dinely  brothers  as  regards  the 
Charlton  estate,  and  to  have  come  down  there  and  made 
a  great  splash  for  about  a  year,  a  coach  and  six  being 
among  the  trifling  incidentals  of  his  entourage.  He 
was  widely  connected  in  and  about  Worcester  and 
educated  at  the  King's  School.     A  story  runs,  apropos 


104  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of  his  lavish  tendencies,  that  during  a  visit  of  his  old 
schoolmaster  to  Charlton,  Foote  presented  him  with 
a  costly  piece  of  plate  off  his  sideboard.  The  reverend 
pedagogue,  taken  somewhat  aback  and  seeing  for  a 
moment  the  old  pupil  in  the  host,  blurted  out,  "  And 
pray,  sir,  what  did  all  these  fine  things  cost  you  ?  " 
"  Indeed,  sir,"  was  the  ready  answer,  "I  know  not  what 
they  cost,  but  I  shall  very  soon  know  what  they  will 
sell  for."  Being  founders'  kin  the  young  Foote  had 
gone  as  a  scholar  to  Worcester  College,  Oxford — a 
foundation  intimately  associated,  as  its  name  imphes, 
with  this  county .  The  college  and  the  born  comedian , 
however,  wearied  of  one  another  in  a  year  or  two,  when 
he  repaired  to  Bath  and  there  played  cards  and  lived 
with  a  bravery  that  suited  his  genius  better  than  his 
purse.  Nash,  the  county  historian,  was  at  school  with 
Foote  and  speaks  with  admiration  of  the  inimitable 
manner  in  which  as  a  boy  he  took  off  the  worthies  of 
Worcester  at  whose  houses  he  visited,  and  how  he 
declaimed  the  satires  of  Horace  in  schoolhours  with 
such  humour  as  to  keep  boys  and  masters  alike  in  loud, 
uncontrollable  laughter. 

An  iron  bridge  carries  the  road  across  the  Avon 
beyond  Cropthorne,  and  in  a  mile  or  so  lands  the 
wanderer  at  Fladbury,  a  place  of  pleasant  reputa- 
tion and  one  which  the  eye  of  merry  tripper  and 
reflective  solitary  alike  are  glad  to  rest  upon  ;  a  place 
of  brimming  glassy  waters,  on  which  the  shadow  of 
overhanging  foliage  quivers  in  the  wake  of  the  gliding 
boat ;  a  scene  of  terraced  lawns  and  mellow  sunny  walls 
beyond  ;  of  a  mill,  a  tumbling  lasher  and  a  rope-ferry, 
perhaps  the  most  complete  example  of  the  many 
delectable  riverside  studies,  to  put  it  from  a  canvas 
point  of  view,  of  the  type  in  which  the  Avon  excels. 
Crowning  the  summit  of  its  terraced  lawns,  that  dip 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  105 

to  the  river,  is  one  of  the  finest  rectories  in  England,  of 
Queen  Anne  exterior  but  older  date.  On  the  plateau 
behind,  a  pleasant  village  straggles  intermittently 
round  a  green,  along  one  side  of  which,  behind  a  fringe 
of  limes,  stretches  the  yard  and  precincts  of  an  ample 
fifteenth  century  church.  Part  of  the  massive  em- 
battled tower  is  Norman,  but  the  nave,  aisles,  and 
chancel  are  of  the  Perpendicular  period  recently  re- 
stored. Among  the  ancient  monuments  within  is  a 
fine  altar  tomb  of  polished  Purbeck  marble,  with  brass 
effigies,to  John  Throckmorton, sub-treasurer  of  England, 
1445,  and  his  wife.  The  family  got  their  name,  famous 
always  in  Worcestershire  and  West  Warwickshire, 
from  Throckmorton,  now  a  chapelrie  of  this  parish. 
Here  still  stands  a  considerable  portion  of  their  ancient 
brick  and  timber  manor  house,  for  some  time  a  farm, 
but  still  in  the  hands  of  the  Throckmorton  family. 
There  are  several  flat  brasses  of  about  the  same 
date  in  Fladbury  Church,  and  some  old  tiles  of  the 
sixteenth  century  ;  while  in  two  or  three  windows  are 
the  arms  of  various  notabilities  who  fought  in  the 
battle  of  Evesham — Montfort,  Despenser,  Mortimer, 
and  others. 

The  excellent  S^monds,  who  accompanied  the  king 
in  the  Civil  War  and  left  such  a  chatty  and  informing 
itinerary,  notices  these  as  having  been  in  part  smashed 
by  Waller's  men  a  fortnight  before.  Most  interesting 
perhaps  of  all  is  the  half-length  effigy,  placed  high 
up  against  the  wall  under  a  canopy,  of  Lloyd,  bishop 
successively  of  St.  Asaph,  Lichfield,  and  Worcester, 
interesting  if  only  for  the  fact  of  his  having  been  one 
of  the  Seven  Bishops  who  defied  James  H,  and  were 
sent  to  the  Tower  for  it.  He  died  at  Hartlebury 
Palace,  where  I  have  seen  an  excellent  portrait  of  him, 
at  ninety  odd,  and,  though  an  author  of  many  books,  it 


io6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

was  rather  perhaps  the  many  various  political  and 
religious  phases  he  had  to  figure  in  that  gives  him  chief 
importance.  A  man  who  began  to  be  a  bishop  in  the 
reign  of  Charles  II,  and  was  still  a  bishop,  active  at 
least  in  disputation,  under  George  I,  must  have  been 
weather-beaten  as  few  prelates  in  history  by  the  storms 
and  changes  of  the  ecclesiastical  atmosphere.  At  one 
time  we  find  him  accused  of  encouraging  the  Church 
of  Rome,  though  vigorously  defended  by  Evelyn,  who 
never  heard,  he  declared,  more  orthodox  and  Christian 
discourses.  At  another  he  is  extolled  for  his  for- 
bearance towards  Dissenters.  He  was  the  only  one 
of  the  vSeven  Bishops  who  made  friends  with  William 
III.  He  would  have  none  of  Dr.  Sacheverell,  and  re- 
moved the  Worcester  bell-ropes  lest  the  mob  should 
ring  them  as  that  clerical  humbug  passed  through  to 
his  Shropshire  living,  and  to  deserved  obscurity,  for 
which  the  mob  broke  his  windows.  He  was  a  pious, 
learned,  amiable  and  charitable  man,  with  a  good 
stout  heart.  And  he  may  be  forgiven  if  in  his  nine- 
tieth year  he  launched  into  prophecy,  foretelling  to  the 
queen,  out  of  the  Book  of  Revelation,  that  a  great 
religious  war  was  due  in  four  years,  in  which  the  King 
of  France  would  be  a  Protestant  champion  and  the 
Pope  of  Rome  destroyed.  Swift,  in  relating  this,  calls 
him  an  old  fool  and  affirms  that  he  waxed  quarrelsome. 
Most  of  us  can  remember  octogenarian  Evangelicals 
who,  in  the  security  of  their  own  approaching  end, 
terrified  one  in  youth  with  much  worse  forecasts  than 
this,  which  was  fantastically  and  optimistically  com- 
forting and  Protestant.  When  the  bishop  was  a 
young  tutor  at  Wadham  he  had  perpetrated  a  practical 
joke  of  a  theological  kind  on  the  dons,  so  audacious 
that  he  had  "  to  abscond  "  for  a  time.  Perhaps  in  the 
fullness  of  years  the  old  Adam,  as  is  notoriously  likely. 


BREDON  TO  EVESHAM  107 

broke  out  again  and  he  tried  his  hand  on  royalty.  At 
any  rate,  he  was  a  famous  man,  made  more  so  by  the 
length  of  time  he  remained  upon  a  shifting  stage  ;  and 
his  dust  reposes  at  Fladbury,  not  the  least  of  its  many 
associations.  Another  is  the  encampment  here  of  a 
wing  of  King  Charles's  army  during  his  occupation 
of  Evesham  in  1644,  and,  according  to  Symonds,  who 
certainly  ought  to  know,  the  presence  of  the  king 
himself.  One  of  the  better  known  of  the  smaller 
religious  houses,  a  cell  to  Worcester,  dating  back  to 
Saxon  times,  accounts  for  Fladbury,  and  was  in  short 
its  fons  et  origo.  Here,  about  1600,  resided  William 
Sandys,  who  expended  a  sum  equal  to  ;/^ioo,ooo  of  our 
money  in  making  the  Avon  navigable  for  vessels  of 
fifty  tons  from  Tewkesbury  to  Stratford,  an  enterprise 
which  enabled  the  people  of  the  vale,  we  are  told, 
to  get  cheap  coal.  Evesham,  four  miles  up,  is  now 
the  head  of  navigation,  which  upon  any  scale  of  this 
kind  is  wholly  represented  by  the  small  steamers  that 
in  summer-time  carry  local  holiday-makers  or  Birming- 
ham trippers,  on  enjoyable  if  protracted  pilgrimages, 
through  those  many  locks  that,  for  aught  I  know, 
we  owe  to  the  enterprise  of  William  Sandys. 

There  must  have  been  a  former  rectory  on  the  scale 
of  this  one,  for  Symonds  even  in  his  day  speaks  of 
Fladbury  rectory  as  a  "  fine,  large,  old,  and  statelie 
parsonage,"  and  then  proceeds  to  admire  the  "  parson's 
wife  —  a  young  woman  —  so  far  from  pride,  often 
carrying  the  milk  payle  on  her  head  in  the  street". 
An  acquaintance,  who  is  a  final  authority  on  every- 
thing concerned  with  Worcestershire,  related  to  me 
how  a  member  of  his  own  family  in  times  past  was 
the  unintentional  perpetrator  of  a  terrible  practical 
joke  on  the  owners  at  that  time  of  the  advowson  of 
Fladbury,  still  a  good  living  as  things  are  now,  but 


io8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

then  a  great  prize.  The  young  man  in  question 
being,  as  was  supposed,  in  a  rapid  dechne,  with  perhaps 
a  year  of  life  left  in  him,  was  inducted  as  a  stopgap, 
pending  the  full  qualification  of  the  patron's  young 
relative  or  friend.  But  the  dying  man,  to  the  dismay 
of  the  other  parties,  the  rightful  owners,  as  de  facto 
they  were,  came  back  to  life  and  strength  under 
the  mild  and  balmy  air  of  Fladbury.  And  not  only 
that,  but  he  enjo^^ed  the  emoluments  and  dignities 
of  a  rector  of  Fladbury  for  fifty  long  years,  outliving 
everybody  interested  in  his  death.  Between  Fladbury 
and  Evesham,  for  the  whole  four  miles,  the  Avon 
keeps  a  good  width  and  even  tide,  admirable  for 
boating,  and  runs  picturesquely  at  the  distance  of  a 
field  or  two  along  the  foot  of  the  high  wooded  ridges 
attached  to  Wood-Norton,  the  seat  of  the  Duke  of 
Orleans,  the  present  King  of  France,  according  to 
Legitimist  faith. 

Chadbury  Lock,  where  the  river  tumbles  over  a 
sloping  weir  and  ripples  in  broad  shallow  and  pool 
towards  a  water-mill,  marks  another  of  many  like 
pictures  on  the  Avon.  The  river  continues  to  keep 
its  breadth  and  steady  flow  as  it  swerves  out  from 
beneath  the  leafy  slopes  of  Wood-Norton,  and  passing 
under  Vineyard  Hill,  and  by  Bengeworth  Ferry  and 
Hampton  Church,  sweeps  round  the  long  ridge  upon 
which  Evesham  is  so  conspicuously  planted. 


I 


CHAPTER  IV 
BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS 

THOUGH  the  Avon  proper  takes  the  long  circuit 
round  Bredon  Hill,  the  latter,  though  posing, 
and  very  beautifully  so  for  a  time,  as  its. eastern  wall, 
is  really  but  an  isolated  hump  rising  in  the  middle 
of  the  broader  vale  of  Cotswold.  But  for  Bredon 
the  Avon  valley  might  be  described  as  a  shallow 
depression  hugging  the  Worcestershire  or  northern 
escarpment  of  this  much  wider  vale  that  lies  between 
the  steep  Cotswold  slopes  and  the  walls  of  the  central 
plateau  of  Worcestershire  which  the  Avon  actually 
washes.  This  broad  vale  from  Tewkesbury  to 
Evesham,  seven  or  eight  miles  in  width,  and  this 
lower  stage  of  it  nearly  twice  as  long,  is  all  in  fact 
the  Avon  valley,  and  none  the  less  so  because  the 
river  clings  to  the  farther  edge  instead  of  taking 
what  looks  from  any  eminence  its  more  natural 
course  down  the  middle.  The  road  from  Tewkesbury 
to  Evesham  very  naturally  adopts  this  latter  plan, 
while  the  few  trifling  brooks  that  come  down  out  of 
the  Cotswolds,  heading  north-west  for  the  main 
river,  seem  to  despair  of  finding  it  after  a  time,  and 
turn  sharply  to  the  ea<=t  or  west  for  Tewkesbury 
or  Evesham.  But,  as  the  traveller  between  the  two 
old  abbey  towns  takes  what  is  both  the  modern  and 
the  ancient  route,  he  leaves  the  Avon  without  even 
a  passing  glimpse  of  it  at  Tewkesbury,  and  in  due 


no  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

course  has  the  whole  of  Bredon  Hill  between  himself 
and  it.  Where  precisely  the  vale  of  Evesham  ter- 
minates, if  at  all,  or  by  how  many  people,  if  any, 
part  of  this  clearly  defined  compact  wedge  of  country 
is  called  the  vale  of  Cotswold,  we  need  not  pause  to 
inquire.  The  whole  area  between  the  Avon  and  the 
Cotswold  is  one  country  and  one  people,  pursuing 
the  same  industries,  belonging  to  the  same  stock, 
elbowing  one  another  in  highway  and  market,  talking 
the  same  dialect  with  the  same  inflection,  and  all 
alike  looking  to  the  top  of  Bredon  Hill  for  indications 
of  that  weather,  fair  or  foul,  which  concerns  them  all 
so  vitally.  Probably  from  time  immemorial  they 
shared  the  same  characteristics  of  blood  and  race — 
Cornivii  in  British,  Hwicci  in  Saxon  times — later  on 
as  ordinary  Englishmen,  sharing  the  distinction  of 
being  neither  Borderers  nor  Midlanders.  So  far, 
however,  nothing  could  be  simpler,  nor  could  a  more 
homogeneous  people,  living  in  a  fat  and  happy  and 
beautiful  valley,  be  encountered.  And  all  this  in 
spite  of  county  delimitations  of  an  absolutely  dis- 
tracting kind.  I  suppose  that  the  natives  between 
Stratford  and  Tewkesbury  know  whether  their  par- 
ticular parish  is  in  Worcester,  Gloucester,  or  War- 
wick, since  this  little  matter  goes  back  very  likely  to 
the  time  of  Alfred  ;  while  proclamations  upon  church 
doors  and  police  stations,  to  say  nothing  of  general 
and  other  elections,  doubtless  serve  to  keep  them  in 
mind  of  it.  But  I  would  strongly  recommend  the 
intelligent  stranger,  who  is  out  to  enjoy  himself,  not 
to  worry  here  about  county  boundaries.  Possibly, 
he  would  not  do  so  in  any  case,  but  some  people  have 
a  fancy  for  keeping  track  of  what  county  they  are 
in,  and  a  kind  of  superstitious  though  worthy 
reverence  for  the  hedge  or  road  or  hill  that  divides 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  in 

historic  shires.  I  have  it  strongly  myself,  but  here 
I  soon  gave  it  up,  and  the  more  readily,  as  one  can 
see  at  a  glance  how  little  significance  such  landmarks 
have.  Nowhere  in  England,  as  the  first  glance  at  a 
map  will  reveal,  are  there  such  ragged  edges  or  such 
hopeless  confusion  as  along  the  border  of  Worcester 
and  Gloucester  and  the  western  edge  of  Warwickshire. 
It  is  not  only  the  wedges  and  loops  that  the  counties 
alternately  drive  into  one  another's  vitals,  but  a  perfect 
archipelago  of  Worcestershire  islands  float  about  in 
the  other  two  shires.  How  it  comes  about  that  in 
these  days,  when  the  county  has  become  like  others 
a  unit  of  rural  organization,  that  such  vagaries  have 
not  been  attended  to  I  cannot  imagine.  The  County 
Council  steam-roller  must  puff  laboriously  over  miles 
of  alien  highway  to  get  to  its  outlying  colonies.  The 
parliamentary  candidate  and  the  election  agent 
following  the  same  weary  course,  one  would  think 
might  be  instructive  object-lessons  for  reform.  I 
do  not  know  whether  the  inhabitants  of  these  out- 
lying islands,  which  have  or  had  lately  their  counter- 
parts elsewhere,  are  extra  patriotic  in  the  matter  of 
province,  like  the  people  of  Guernsey  and  Jersey, 
for  instance.  Worcestershire  is  a  notorious  colonizer. 
It  owns  a  big  island,  for  instance,  in  Staffordshire,  of 
which  Dudley  is  the  capital.  Till  lately  it  flung 
thumb  and  fingers  over  the  Malvern  Hills,  that 
stupendous  racial  barrier,  into  the  lowlands  of 
Herefordshire,  but  they  have  recently,  I  believe,  been 
snipped  off.  These  mutual  raids  begin  at  Tewkesbury. 
Gloucester  makes  a  flagrant  jump  far  over  Nature's 
boundary  at  the  mouth  of  the  Avon,  and  may  be  said 
first  to  provoke  the  mutual  aggression  that  goes  on 
all  along  the  line,  of  which,  however,  we  will  say 
nothing  more  and  take  no  account  of,  as  humanity 


112  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

here,  if  not  county  boundaries,  has  for  ages  been  at 
one. 

And  in  view  of  this,  what  of  the  dialect  ?  And  what, 
in  truth,  is  much  more  than  dialect — for  mere  archaic 
words  are  common  to  groups  of  counties — intonation 
and  pronunciation.  But,  grouping  all  three  under  the 
accepted  designation,  an  ear  for  dialect,  like  an  ear  for 
music,  is  in  a  sense  born.  It  is  neither  so  useful,  nor 
so  ornamental,  nor  at  the  same  time  so  general  as  the 
latter.  Nevertheless  it  is  a  great  comfort  in  life  and 
especially  so  to  the  individual  thus  endowed  who  has 
a  turn  for  cultivating  it,  though  it  has  nothing  to  do 
with  music  and  implies  no  gift  of  tongues  in  the 
accepted  sense  of  the  term.  As  regards  the  former, 
most  of  the  famous  singers  I  have  heard,  who  delight 
one  with  ballads  in  a  vernacular  not  their  own,  are 
conspicuously  wanting  in  this  particular  form  of  ear. 
Most  of  the  educated  men  or  women  I  have  known 
who  have  this  sense  and  expression  of  vernacular 
strong  within  them,  are  neither  musicians  nor  linguists 
in  any  appreciable  degree,  but  have  of  necessity  the 
saving  sense  of  humour  even  when  archaeologists,  which 
a  few  of  them  are.  Some  are  only  past-masters  in  the 
vanishing  rustic  dialect  of  their  own  district.  Others, 
from  greater  opportunity  perhaps,  are  keenly  alive  to, 
and  often  apt  in  all  forms  of  dialect  that  they  encounter 
in  a  wider  life.  A  great  majority  of  people,  however, 
are  practically  deaf  and  dumb  to  anything  of  the  kind, 
and  only  conscious  of  its  more  aggressive  or,  to  them, 
incoherent  forms.  To  so  modest  a  predilection  one  may 
freely  confess  without  breach  of  taste  or  charge  of 
egotism,  and  from  a  tender  age  the  vernacular  has 
been  to  me  a  frequent  source  of  comfort,  interest,  and 
enjoyment.  I  have  been  also  somewhat  blessed  in 
opportunity  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.     For  the 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  113 

language  of  the  country  people  in  the  old  States  of 
America  is  intimately  linked  with  that  of  our  own. 

But  never  had  it  been  given  me  to  know  anything  at 
all  of  the  spoken  tongue  of  the  people  who  inhabit 
the  country  between  Stratford  and  Gloucester,  to 
indicate  thus  roughly  a  region  that  would  have  to 
be  much  extended  and  elaborated  in  a  dialect  map. 
Testimony  of  a  singularly  convincing  nature  to  its 
peculiar  note  was  afforded  me,  and  in  socurious  afashion 
that  I  shall  venture  the  interpolation.  Now  long  ago, 
but  for  many  years,  and  several  times  a  year,  it  fell 
to  me  to  meet  a  particular  individual  hailing  from 
these  parts.  He  was  of  a  type,  it  so  happened,  removed 
above  suspicion  of  any  vulgar  tongue.  Nor  had  he 
any,  but  only  a  peculiar  lilt  and  pitch  of  voice  at  the 
end  of  his  sentences  which  became,  so  far  as  I  was 
concerned,  a  feature  quite  inseparable  from  his  person- 
ality— a  mere  individual  trick  or  habit  I  took  it 
for.  Our  intercourse  had  ceased  for  years  and  I  had 
practically  forgotten  all  about  him. 

The  speech  beyond  the  Severn,  and  that  again  on  the 
nether  side  of  the  Cotswolds,  were  both  familiar  to  me 
of  old.  But  when  I  came  down  for  the  first  time 
to  Tewkesbury,  and  into  contact  with  the  remote 
descendants  of  the  Hwicci  living  up  and  down  the 
Avon  and  Severn  valley,  my  whilom  friend  leaped 
out  of  the  past,  out  of  the  grave,  for  all  I  know,  to 
greet  me  in  every  shop  and  farmhouse,  in  every 
inn  -  parlour.  He  discoursed  with  me  at  country 
stations  in  the  uniform  of  a  porter  or  a  station-master, 
he  opened  church  doors  for  me  in  the  garb  of  a 
sexton,  and  even  as  a  stone-breaker  discussed  old- 
age  pensions  or  more  immediately  pertinent  matters 
by  the  roadside.  That  is  to  say,  they  all  alike  rendered 
the  two  final  syllables  of  every  sentence  as  he  rendered 


1 14  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

them,  and  in  a  fashion  that  at  the  uttermost  end  of 
the  earth  I  now  understand  would  proclaim  the  native 
of  the  vale  of  Evesham  and  the  Severn  side.  For 
example,  "  'Ee  zed  'ee  wur  goin'  to  Chelt'ham.  I 
don't  know  as  'ee  ought  to  ".  The  first  syllable  of 
Cheltenham  would  drop  about  two  notes  below  the 
normal  sound  of  the  rest  of  the  sentence,  and  the  last 
syllable  rise  one  above  it.  The  same  would  occur  in 
"  ought  to  ". 

This  is  the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  the  speech 
between  Evesham  and  Cheltenham,  and  a  good  deal 
more  besides.  You  cannot,  unfortunately,  put  a  county 
to  it,  since  it  is  shared  by  portions  of  three  counties — 
one  might  almost  say  of  four.  For  though  weakening 
greatly  as  you  approach  Stratford  and  the  Warwick- 
shire speech,  I  have  heard  it  distinctly  on  the  tongues 
of  natives  of  the  western  fringe  of  that  county.  On 
crossing  the  Severn  it  overlaps  a  trifle  into  Hereford- 
shire, where  it  soon,  however,  gives  way  to  the  true 
Border-Welsh  sing-song  which  distinguishes  that 
county  in  different  degrees.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the 
intonation  in  question  is  the  first  faint  sign  of  the 
Welsh  lilt  ;  at  any  rate,  the  two  final  notes  are  nothing 
more  than  the  familiar  Welsh  accentuation  coming 
suddenly  and  unexpectedly  at  the  end  of  a  stolid 
Saxon  monotone,  otherwise  we  have  here  the  ordinary 
South  Saxontongue  burring  softly  on  the  "r's",  buzzing 
slightly  on  the  "s's",  and  gloriously  "aitchless  "  ;  that 
tongue  which  with  variations  comes  up  from  Sussex, 
leaving  the  direful  ever-encroaching  Cockney  belt  upon 
the  right,  through  Hants,  Berks,  and  Wilts,  where  it 
is  broadest,  and  thence  through  Gloucestershire  across 
the  Cotswolds,  not  sensibly  altering  till  on  the  farther 
side  of  these  hills  it  suddenly  achieves  the  two  eccentric 
final  notes  which  stamp  it  and  have  almost  the  Welsh 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  115 

ring.  I  do  not  profess  to  have  beaten  the  bounds  of 
this  vernacular,  and  if  I  had,  very  few  readers  would 
thank  me  for  an  itinerary  of  the  same,  I  did  not  find 
it  noticeable  along  the  top  of  the  Cotswolds  above  this 
Avon  valley,  but  towards  Cheltenham  it  must  surely 
climb  the  hills  ?  It  was  interesting,  as  I  said  before,  to 
note  it  die  away  up  the  Avon  valley  into  the  ordinary 
Warwickshire  dialect,  another  and  less  attractive 
speech  altogether.  I  have  amused  myself,  too,  while  in 
central  and  northern  Worcestershire,  by  the  mingling 
of  this  tongue  with  the  harder  "Midland"  that  runs 
a  long  way  into  the  county  for  both  natural  and 
artificial  reasons.  But  down  here,  at  any  rate,  between 
Tewkesbury  and  Evesham,  this  unmistakable  and 
uncatalogued  dialect  is  in  full  possession  of  the  field. 
If  Shakespeare  did  not  speak  it,  he  was  at  any  rate 
within  four  or  five  miles  of  many  who  did,  and  among 
them  were  doubtless  some  of  his  relations  and  many 
of  his  friends. 

For,  some  miles  up  from  Tewkesbury,  one  is  conscious 
of  being  on  the  ancient  bed  of  the  Severn,  that  lagoon- 
like estuary,  which  probably,  when  the  Romans  came, 
clave  the  country  up  to  Worcester  and  Bewdley,  But 
in  this  level  stretch  of  grain  and  grass,  hedgerow  and 
orchard,  radiant  in  the  dress  of  high  summer  and  a 
warm  and  fertile  soil,  there  is  in  truth  no  touch  of 
monotony.  On  the  contrary,  it  the  better  serves  to 
display  the  hills  and  ranges  which  group  themselves 
upon  the  far  or  near  horizon,  since  here  for  a  while  you 
may  still  look  round  the  south-western  corner  of  the 
Cotswolds,  and  down  the  long  wide  plain  of  the  Severn, 
into  which  the  high  downs  with  their  sharp  quarried 
summits  dip  in  successive  spurs  as  some  lofty  but  not 
precipitous  coast-line  droops  to  the  sea.  Finger-posts 
mark  the  road  to  Cheltenham,  and  the  distance  is 


ii6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

eight  miles  and  southward  along  the  glowing  plain, 
which  from  the  level  suggests  an  almost  unbroken 
stretch  of  woodland  ;  with  a  church  tower  or  spire 
shooting  up  here  and  there,  you  can  almost  see  that 
pleasant  haunt  of  leisurely  middle  age  and  vigorous 
youth. 

Dim  across  the  Severn  are  the  blue  hills  of  Mon- 
mouth. But  behind,  like  a  range  of  mountains  that 
have  wandered  out  of  Wales,  are  the  eight  peaks  of 
the  Malverns.  And  this  fancy  comes  more  especially 
when  there  is  a  haze  in  the  air,  or  when  the  sun  has 
dropped  behind  them,  or  again  in  the  murk  of  winter 
storms,  above  all,  perhaps,  when  clad  with  snow.  At 
all  times  beautiful,  in  bright  clear  weather,  when  this 
mystic  cloak  is  off  them  they  become  too  lavish  of 
detail  and  display  their  really  gentle  qualities,  their 
green  slopes  and  folding  combes.  Those  three  thou- 
sand feet  or  so  of  veiled  crag  and  rugged  steep  that  the 
Malverns  can  so  effectively  impose  upon  one's  vision 
become  merely  beautiful  and  quite  hospitable-looking 
hills  of  half  the  height,  with  Cheltenham's  rival  gleam- 
ing faintly  in  white  terraces  well  up  their  slopes  and 
braving  the  fullest  terrors  of  that  east  wind  from 
which  the  Cotswolds  shelter  Cheltenham.  About 
four  miles  from  Tewkesbury,  at  a  parting  of  many  ways, 
stands  an  eccentric  finger-post  of  seventeenth  century 
date,  known  as  Teddington  Hands.  The  full  informa- 
tion to  travellers  inscribed  upon  it  is  no  doubt  of  more 
recent  editing  and  in  line  with  the  County  Council 
finger  -  posts  which  are  creditably  in  evidence  in  a 
country  which  just  here  is  rather  a  network  of  roads. 
Outliers  of  the  Cotswolds  begin  to  crop  up  inconse- 
quently  like  lesser  Bredons,  Oxenton  on  the  right, 
and  Dumbleton  farther  on,  each  shooting  straight  up 
to  the  height  of  seven  or  eight  hundred  feet.     Oxenton 


BELOW  THE  COTS  WOLDS  117 

at  least  is  that,  well  shaped  and  partly  wooded  with 
a  church  and  village  nestling  at  its  foot. 

I  do  not  propose  to  carry  the  reader  in  this  chapter 
along  the  main  road  to  Evesham,  as  there  is  nothing 
of  particular  note  for  the  next  few  miles  but  a  con- 
tinual study  at  fairly  close  quarters  of  the  long  south- 
eastern face  of  Bredon  Hill,  of  which  no  doubt  I 
shall  be  thought  to  have  already  said  quite  enough. 
But  at  Teddington  Hands  a  road  branches  away  to 
Winchcomb  at  the  foot  of  the  Cotswolds,  and  from 
thence  Evesham  may  be  reached  by  a  choice  of  roads. 
Now  Winchcomb  is  a  Cotswold  town  architecturally, 
and  should  not  be  missed  by  any  one  traversing  the 
Avon  valley,  particularly  if  he  cannot  make  the 
opportunity  to  penetrate  to  Chipping  Camden,  the 
other  town  of  this  type  on  this  side  of  the  range,  and 
indeed  a  much  finer  one.  But  close  to  Winchcomb 
is  Sudely,  and  Sudely  is  worth  an  effort  to  reach  : 
first,  because  it  is  a  beautiful  old  house  and  spot ; 
secondly,  for  its  connexion  with  Katherine  Parr, 
the  surviving  wife  of  Henry  VHI,  who  died  and 
lies  buried  there ;  and  thirdly,  for  its  association  with 
Charles  I  and  the  Civil  War. 

It  is  some  half  -  dozen  miles  from  Teddington 
Hands  to  Winchcomb,  and  in  early  July,  at  least,  if 
there  is  nothing  definite  to  give  one  pause  by  the  way, 
there  is  much  that  is  pleasing  to  beguile  it.  The 
clover  and  ryegrass  are  already  shorn  stubbles,  but 
the  horse  -  mower  is  rattling  through  the  meadow 
hay,  while  the  swathes  of  yesterday  look  almost  white 
against  the  opulent  foliage  of  the  huge  elms  which 
in  this  country  so  commonly  both  line  the  highway 
and  divide  the  fields.  The  wheat  and  barley,  too,  are 
just  beginning  to  wave  their  green  heads  dubiously, 
one  might    well  think,   with  the  recollection  of   the 


ii8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

futile  years  behind  and  the  perhaps  more  hopeful  ones 
to  come. 

However,  there  is  sufficient  grain  still  grown  even 
in  the  West  Midlands  to  give  the  landscape  those 
effective  touches  we  look  for  in  harvest-time  and 
autumn.  At  Teddington  Hands,  too,  where  one  swerves 
away  to  Winchcomb  and  the  Cotswold  foot,  one  has 
scarcely  entered  the  true  garden  district  of  the  vale  of 
Evesham,  though  nigh  upon  the  verge  of  it.  By  the 
roadside  a  diminutive,  long-deserted  church,  standing 
in  an  orchard,  once  served  the  villages  of  the  two 
Washbournes  which  lie  over  towards  the  foot  of 
Dumbleton  Hill.  This  Gloucestershire  village,  for  we 
are  now  for  the  moment  in  that  county,  was  the 
origin  of  a  well-known  old  Worcestershire  family 
of  that  name  and  of  Wickenford  near  Worcester. 
As  Worcestershire  squires,  at  any  rate,  they  are  long 
extinct,  but  a  branch  of  them  went  to  America,  where 
they  still  flourish  on  several  stems  ;  so  much  so,  I 
think,  that  the  ear  of  my  American  pilgrim  who 
explores  this  delectable  vale  at  leisure — if  any  such 
escape  from  the  tyranny  of  convention — would  be 
caught  by  it.  There  are  many  tombs  of  the  Wash- 
bournes  in  Wickenford  church.  One  of  them  com- 
memorates the  most  worthy  perhaps  of  them  all, 
John  Washbourne,  who  died  in  1632.  Habington,  the 
first  county  historian,  who  knew  him  personally,  styles 
him  "  the  most  contynual  housekeeper  and  the  best 
loved  gentleman  in  the  county."  He  was  on  the  Com- 
mission of  the  Peace  for  sixty  years.  His  grandson. 
Colonel  John  Washbourne,  was  a  prominent  Loyalist, 
and  heavily  fined  after  the  war ;  but  he  managed,  it 
is  said,  to  get  even  with  the  sequestrators  by  paying 
them  in  base  coin. 

Passing    Stanley    (Pontlarge)   and    Gretton,    some 


BELOW  THE  COTS  WOLDS  119 

semi-detached  flankers  of  the  Cotswolds,  seven  or 
eight  hundred  feet  in  height,  stand  out  near  by  upon 
the  right,  and  Winchcomb  upon  the  toes  of  the  main 
ridge  is  partly  enfolded  in  a  pretty  confusion  of  green 
hill  and  wooded  combe.  Though  not  immediately 
concerned  with  us  here,  I  should  like  to  note,  for  the 
benefit  of  the  alien,  how  striking  is  the  road  from  here 
to  Cheltenham,  mounting,  as  it  does,  the  great  shoulder 
of  Cleeve  Hill — a  mile  and  a  half  push,  by  the  way, 
for  the  cyclist, — but  offering  full  compensation  for  the 
toil  in  the  magnificent  prospect  unfolded  from  the 
summit,  down  the  Severn  valley. 

Winchcomb,  as  already  noted,  is  a  Cotswold  town. 
Just  as,  coming  up  from  the  flint  or  half-timbered 
thatched  -  roofed  villages  of  south  and  mid  Wilts, 
one  encounters  the  solid  stone  villages  of  north-west 
Wilts  and  Gloucester  on  the  southern  side  of  the  Cots- 
wolds, so  here,  from  the  black  and  white  of  the  west 
Midland  belt,  one  runs  suddenly  on  the  northern 
slope  of  the  same  range  into  wholly  another  archi- 
tectural atmosphere.  The  facility  with  which  it 
can  be  quarried  and  fashioned  for  use,  together  with 
the  durability  and  hardness  which  it  assumes  after- 
wards, makes  this  an  ideal  building  stone,  while  the 
warm,  greyish  brown  mellow  tint,  with  which  time 
so  speedily  endows  it,  satisfies  that  other,  c^sthetic 
sense,  to  an  uncommon  degree.  A  Cotswold  house 
not  a  century  old  combines  an  air  of  the  gravest 
antiquity  with  one  of  unquestioned  solidity  and 
cheerful  comfort.  A  Northumbrian  cottage  of  whin- 
stone,  built  two  hundred  years  ago,  very  often  looks 
precisely  like  its  neighbour  built  the  day  before  yester- 
day, an  achievement  creditable  perhaps,  but  not 
aesthetic.  This  great  susceptibility  to  treatment, 
coupled   with   the    abundance   of    supply,   seems   to 


I20  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

raise  the  standard  both  in  comfort  and  design  of 
buildings  of  every  degree  throughout  the  Cotswold 
county.  The  long,  narrow  street  trailing  up  to  the 
slope  on  the  top  of  which  the  fine  church  of  Winch- 
comb  stands,  with  its  many  low  stone  houses,  is 
not  comparable  in  distinction  with  many  of  the  Cots- 
wold towns.  It  is  characteristic,  however,  and  inter- 
esting, while  the  "  Seymour  Arms  ",  the  principal  house 
of  call,  in  the  High  Street,  is  a  fine  specimen  of  six- 
teenth century  work. 

At  the  head  of  the  main  street  is  an  open  space 
fringed  with  the  sort  of  houses  you  expect  to  see  in 
every  little  country  town,  standing  somewhat  aloof 
from  its  madding  crowd,  but  near  enough  to  keep 
professional  touch  of  its  needs.  Here  is  the  site  of 
the  ancient  priory  of  which  a  fine  old  Tudor  building 
fronting  the  road  looks  almost  as  if  it  might  be  a 
relic,  but  is  actually  an  almshouse  erected  a  little 
later,  while  close  to  it  is  a  noble  Perpendicular  church, 
finely  displayed  in  an  expansive  and  well  -  ordered 
graveyard.  When  I  discovered  on  my  visit  that  the 
custodian  of  the  building,  the  key-bearer  and  cicerone, 
was  of  the  gentler  sex,  I  felt  that  a  faint  shadow 
had  fallen  upon  the  coming  treat.  I  like  the  male 
sexton  of  the  little  country  church,  when  he  is  in 
evidence,  not  for  his  historical  contributions  to  my 
acquaintance  with  his  church,  which  are  usually 
slight  or  fantastic,  but  for  what  he  often  is,  and  for 
his  stimulating  converse  on  matters  general.  He 
always  wears,  moreover,  a  pleasant  air  of  indifference 
to  the  flight  of  time,  which  is  precisely  the  state  of 
mind  you  should  be  in  yourself  to  properly  enjoy  a 
country  church  and  all  that  is  therein,  visible  and 
invisible.  But  the  lady  is  apt  to  know  less  about  the 
church  even  than  the  other,  howsoever  conscientiously 


BELOW  THE  COTS  WOLDS  121 

she  may  scrub  it,  and  has  seldom  anything  to  say 
worth  hearing  upon  other  subjects.  She  is  also  more 
practical  and  in  a  greater  hurry.  Here,  however,  at 
Winchcomb  was  an  anomaly  in  the  guise  of  a  female 
antiquarian  born  to  the  profession,  I  was  given  to 
understand  ;  for  the  office,  I  have  a  vague  notion, 
was  hereditary  and  had  thus  devolved  upon  a  lady 
who  filled  it  worthily.  For  Winchcomb  church  is  a 
stately  building,  not  one  in  which  the  entertaining 
discourse  of  a  garrulous  gravedigger  would  be  in  order. 
Sudely  Castle  is  but  a  mile  away,  and  as  you  enter 
the  grounds,  through  an  embattled  gateway — modern, 
I  fear — the  large,  low  square  peeps  engagingly  over 
the  finely  timbered  lawns.  And  close  by,  in  the  garden, 
stands  the  little  church,  once  the  castle  chapel,  where 
rests  at  last  the  much-tortured  dust  of  Katherine 
Parr.  Sudely,  originally  a  Norman  fortress,  was 
rebuilt  by  Ralph  de  Botelar,  a  Lancastrian,  about 
the  period  of  the  battle  of  Tewkesbury.  A  sea-going 
baron  was  he,  chief  admiral  against  the  French,  and 
said  to  have  built  much  of  Sudely  Castle  out  of  the 
ransom  paid  him  by  a  captured  admiral  of  that  nation. 
Edward  IV  bought  it,  as  is  hinted,  at  his  own  price, 
after  which  it  remained  with  the  Crown  till  it  becomes 
interesting  as  the  property  of  another  high  admiral, 
Thomas,  Lord  Seymour,  brother  of  the  Protector 
Somerset.  It  had  been  granted  him  by  his  brother, 
the  Duke  of  Somerset  as  regent,  an  equivocal  pro- 
ceeding which  would  quite  possibly  have  been 
cancelled  had  the  young  King  Edward  lived  to 
manhood.  However,  Thomas  Seymour,  Lord  Sudely, 
had  in  1547  married  Katherine  Parr  with  somewhat 
indecorous  haste  after  the  king's  death.  This  hand- 
some, ambitious,  and  unprincipled  person  had  indeed 
been  her  accepted  husband  when  Henry  the  Eighth 


122  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

practically  snatched  her  from  his  arms.  The  admirable 
Katherine  only  just  saved  her  neck  from  the  axe  of 
her  gouty  irascible  spouse,  though  she  humoured  him 
with  great  patience  and  tact.  If  he  had  lived  another 
few  months,  it  is  more  than  probable  he  would  have 
been  persuaded — for  the  initiative  in  this  case  at  least 
was  not  his — to  have  sealed  his  reputation  as  a  Blue- 
beard without  hope  of  an  apologist  in  future  ages. 
A  Bill  of  Attainder  was  actually  drawn  out  by  the 
ecclesiastics  hostile  to  the  queen,  and  while  the 
coarse  old  reprobate  was  blowing  hot  and  cold,  with 
interludes  of  affection  and  an  open  ear  to  the  flatterers 
and  tempters,  he  fortunately  died.  Katherine,  now 
thirty-four  years  of  age,  married  Seymour  with  almost 
indecent  dispatch.  She  was  the  natural  guardian 
both  of  the  Princess  Elizabeth  and  the  Lady  Jane 
Grey,  and  for  her  brief  year  of  married  life  is  said  to 
have  suffered  no  little  from  the  ever  familiar  rompings 
of  her  undisciplined  husband  with  the  young  girl, 
that  in  truth  caused  some  little  scandal.  But  what 
concerns  us  here,  is  that  when  Katherine,  after  three 
childless  marriages,  came  down  to  Sudely  some  weeks 
before  the  birth  of  the  infant  that  caused  her  death. 
Lady  Jane  Grey  came  with  her.  She  had  a  retinue 
that  would  have  done  credit  to  her  previous  condition 
of  queen,  no  less  than  a  hundred  and  twenty  gentlemen 
to  her  household,  a  fact  which  illustrates  how  much 
greater  were  the  openings  for  younger  sons  in  the 
sixteenth  than  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries.  She  had  ladies-in-waiting,  maids  of  honour, 
and  gentlewomen  -  in  -  ordinary,  and,  above  all,  a 
goodly  collection  of  divines  of  the  Reformed  Church, 
her  own  persuasion,  though  it  had  nearly  cost  her 
her  life  as  the  wife  of  the  great  Protestant  champion, 
so  utterly  agog  were  such  things  at  a  period  extolled 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  123 

by  so  many  pious  and  ingenuous  souls.  This 
necessitated  services  twice  a  day  or  oftener,  no  doubt, 
to  give  all  the  preachers  a  chance,  at  which  her  worldly 
husband  absolutely  refused  to  put  in  an  appearance, 
and  proved  himself  altogether  "  a  great  let  and 
hindrance."  But  neither  the  splendour  of  her  house- 
hold nor  the  intercessions  of  the  ministers  availed 
poor  Katherine  aught,  for  seven  days  after  her  child 
was  born  she  died.  The  whole  thing  is  one  of  the 
most  curious  domestic  dramas  in  English  history. 
The  momentarily  distracted  widower  of  Sudely  soon 
turned  his  ambitions  to  supplanting  his  great  brother, 
who,  playing  the  ordinary  game  of  the  period,  soon 
laid  the  younger  by  the  heels  and  had  his  head  off. 
The  girl-child,  through  some  technical  failure  in  will- 
making  on  Katherine's  part,  was  left  a  pauper  and 
bandied  about  among  heartless  relatives  till  she  was 
married,  as  is  credibly  thought,  to  a  Kentish  squire 
named  Bushell.  But  Katherine's  funeral  at  Sudely 
was  magnificent,  with  the  Lady  Jane  Grey,  who  had 
been  with  her  there  all  the  time,  as  chief  mourner. 
It  was  celebrated  indeed  with  almost  royal  splendour, 
and  was,  says  Miss  Strickland,  the  first  royal  funeral 
in  England  observed  with  the  Anglican  ritual.  But 
the  speedy  fate  of  the  husband,  the  pitiful  story  of 
the  child,  of  which  her  ultimate  marriage,  though  the 
least  certain,  is  the  best  part,  the  decay  of  the  splendid 
mansion,  is  capped  by  the  gruesome  tale,  though  a 
much  later  one,  that  relates  to  the  corpse  of  the 
beautiful  and  accomplished  queen.  She  was  origin- 
ally interred  on  the  north  side  of  the  altar  in  the 
then  beautiful  chapel  at  Sudely,  and  a  mural  tablet 
of  sculptured  alabaster  erected  above  her  grave.  In 
course  of  time  the  castle  fell  into  ruins,  and  the 
chapel  with  it. 


124  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

According  to  Rudde's  history  of  Gloucestershire, 
in  the  year  1782,  some  ladies  staying  at  Sudely,  the 
habitable  part  of  which  was  then  used  either  as  an 
inn  or  a  farmhouse,  noticed  in  the  ruined  roofless 
chapel  a  block  of  alabaster  on  the  north  wall,  and 
suspecting  it  to  be  the  back  of  a  vanished  monument, 
had  the  ground  opened  below  it.  There  was  dis- 
covered near  the  surface  a  leaden  envelope  which  they 
opened  in  two  places  and  found  to  enclose  a  human 
body  wrapped  in  cerecloth.  In  lifting  the  latter 
from  the  face,  they  found  the  features,  particularly 
the  eyes,  in  a  perfect  state  of  preservation.  Their 
quest  had  so  far  exceeded  their  expectations  that, 
frightened  at  the  sight  and  at  the  smell  (of  spices) 
which  came  from  the  cerecloth,  they  only  allowed 
themselves  time  to  read  the  inscription  on  the  cofhn, 
which  proclaimed  it  to  be  that  of  Queen  Katheiine, 
and  ordered  the  earth  to  be  hastily  thrown  upon  the 
grave.  In  the  same  summer,  the  tenant  of  the  land 
again  removed  the  earth  from  the  cofhn,  which  lay 
two  feet  below  the  surface,  and  disclosed  the  full 
inscription.  He  opened  part  of  the  coffin,  and  found 
the  body,  which  was  wrapped  in  six  or  seven  linen 
cerecloths,  absolutely  uncorrupted,  though  it  had 
lain  there  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years.  The  flesh 
of  the  arm  which  he  examined  was  white  and  moist. 

These  investigations  were  done  decently  and  in 
order,  but  two  years  later  some  rude  hands,  probably 
treasure-hunting,  dragged  the  body  from  the  tomb 
and  threw  it  on  to  a  heap  of  rubbish,  where  it  lay 
exposed  to  the  pubhc  gaze.  A  credible  witness,  who 
was  present  at  the  time,  relates  that  the  remains  of 
costly  clothing,  not  a  shroud,  were  still  on  Katherine's 
body,  and  shoes  on  her  feet,  which  were  extremely 
small,  and  all  her  proportions  very  delicate,  and  that 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  125 

traces  of  beauty  were  still  perceptible  in  the  face, 
though  under  such  treatment  decay  rapidly  set  in. 
The  parson,  however,  put  in  a  tardy  interference 
and  caused  the  body  to  be  reinterred.  The  incident, 
however,  had  got  about  and  aroused  curiosity,  and 
the  unfortunate  queen  was  not  even  now  allowed  to 
rest  in  peace.  For  in  1786  the  Reverend  Treadway, 
archaeologist  and  historian  of  Worcestershire,  made  an 
authorized  investigation,  the  result  of  which  may 
be  read  in  volume  nine  of  the  "  Archaeologia".  It  is 
enough  to  say  here  that  by  this  time  the  face  had 
decayed,  but  the  body  was  perfect,  the  hand  and  nails 
entire  and  of  a  brownish  colour.  Miss  Strickland,  who 
saw  a  lock  of  Katherine's  hair,  clipped  off  on  one  of 
these  occasions,  describes  it  as  of  exquisite  quality,  like 
threads  of  burnished  gold,  with  an  inclination  to  curl 
naturally.  The  chapel  being  then  a  ruin,  the  rector, 
in  1817,  with  a  view  to  prevent  further  desecration, 
had  the  remains  reburied  in  what  a  visitor  of  that 
day  describes  as  "a  lean-to  building  against  the 
chapel,  where  service  is  sometimes  performed". 

Sudely,  which  had  fallen  to  the  Chandos  family, 
was  held  as  an  important  Royalist  post  for  most  of 
the  Civil  War,  and  the  sixth  Lord  Chandos,  its  owner, 
was  an  active  soldier  on  the  king's  side.  On  New 
Year's  Day,  1643,  the  castle,  then  held  by  only  a 
captain  and  sixty  men,  was  attacked  by  the  resolute 
Massey  from  Gloucester  with  an  overwhelming  force 
and  taken,  but  soon  abandoned,  before  the  virtual  pre- 
dominance which  the  king  soon  acquired  in  the  west 
country.  It  was  for  a  long  time  of  great  importance 
as  commanding  the  route  of  the  Parliamentarians  to 
Gloucester,  their  only  hold  on  the  west.  Nearly  two 
years  later,  during  that  retreat  of  the  king  from  Oxford 
which  Pershore  Bridge  brought  home  to  us.  Waller, 


126  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

and  Massey  who  was  still  at  Gloucester,  met  at 
Sudely  and  captured  it  with  a  number  of  officers  and 
great  spoil.  The  property  was  redeemed  by  Lord 
Chandos  with  a  fine  of  £5000,  but  the  damage  done  to 
chapel,  family  tombs,  and  castle  by  the  Parliamentary 
troops,  for  whom  every  sign  of  grace,  beauty,  or 
elegance  was  anathema,  was  irreparable  and  the 
whole  place  was  abandoned  to  the  bats  and  owls  ;  or, 
to  be  literal,  all  but  such  part  as  served  to  shelter  a 
farmer  and  a  publican  successively. 

About  seventy  years  ago  Sudely  was  purchased 
by  the  Dent  family,  the  great  Worcester  glovers.  The 
north  quadrangle  was  restored  with  singular  success, 
while  a  few  years  later  Sir  Gilbert  Scott  did  the  same 
for  the  church  upon  an  elaborate  scale,  not  forgetting 
a  canopied  altar  tomb  and  effigy  to  Queen  Katherine. 
In  reverent  treatment  and  sense  of  the  past,  Sudely 
was  fortunate  in  its  new  owners.  The  castle  is  not 
shown  to  the  pubhc,  but  it  is  the  exterior  that  possesses 
historically  the  chief  interest,  and  this  is  accessible 
enough,  as  the  church  so  intimately  associated  with 
Henry's  last  queen,  and  almost  touching  the  house, 
is  of  course  shown.  The  grievous  story  of  Katherine's 
desecrated  grave,  though  little  known  generally,  had 
been  familiar  to  me  for  years,  originally  gleaned  in 
the  queen's  native  country  about  Kendal ;  and  to 
find  myself  unexpectedly  at  Sudely,  to  the  very 
situation  of  which,  beyond  the  fact  of  its  county,  I 
admit  a  previous  and  culpable  ignorance,  was  very 
stimulating,  in  spite  of  the  wiping  out  of  the  ruined 
chapel  and  its  complete  restoration. 

The  direct  road  from  Winchcomb  to  Evesham,  for  a 
considerable  distance  at  any  rate,  is  devoid  of  any- 
thing that  is  likely  to  remain  in  the  memory  or  to 
hold  one's  fancy.     But  by  taking  that  which  leads  to 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  127 

Broadway  along  the  base  of  the  Cotsvvolds,  one  gets 
on  closer  terms  with  the  spring  of  the  hills,  which  are 
luxuriant  rather  than  wild,  pretty  interludes  of  wood 
and  grass  enclosures  climbing  to  the  summit,  and  one 
can  easily  see  where  the  wandering  Bredon  gets  its 
characteristics.  The  suggestion  is  always  present 
that  this  high  green  ridge  must  be  topped  by  a  wild 
downland  of  some  sort,  where  turf  prevails  and  trees 
are  not  and  fences  few,  and  homesteads  far  apart, 
with  that  sort  of  glamour  and  atmosphere  which 
belongs  to  high  and  solitary  regions,  such  as  Salisbury 
Plain,  for  instance.  But  the  aspiring  wanderer, 
whether  he  climb  on  foot  through  wood  and  pasture, 
or  push  a  cycle  for  a  mile  and  a  half  uphill,  will  be 
disappointed  if  he  expects  to  find  beyond  the  brow 
anything  of  this  kind,  strong  as  are  the  portents  of  it. 
It  would  not  be  accurate  to  say  that  you  climbed 
seven  or  eight  hundred  feet  out  of  the  vale  of  Evesham 
and  continued  as  before,  for  they  do  not  make  jam  up 
there,  nor  grow  Pershore  plums,  nor  hops,  nor  outdoor 
tomatoes  by  the  acre. 

The  farmers,  who  know  nothing  of  intensive  culture 
and  pursue  the  usual  course  of  the  British  agriculturist 
on  a  liberal  scale,  are  of  a  somewhat  different  breed 
and  habit  from  the  men  of  the  vale.  But  the  un- 
critical wight  will  still  find  himself,  when  he  has 
mounted  the  stairway  into  it,  in  an  enclosed  country, 
with  a  normal  allowance  of  woodland  hedgerow, 
stone  wall,  home-steads,  finger-posts,  hedged-in  roads, 
and  ploughland.  I  resented  this  myself  very  much, 
as  in  the  freshness  of  my  first  and  hottest  week  in 
the  country  I  scaled  the  wall  with  a  view  to  a  peep 
into  the  Cotswolds  of  which  one  hears  so  much.  Other 
portions  of  the  range,  no  doubt,  have  the  nature  of 
the  upland  still  upon  them.     But  this  is  of  no  conse- 


128  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

quence  here  and  none  whatever  to  the  Avon  valley, 
seeing  how  much  it  owes  from  first  to  last  to  the 
outer  rampart  of  this  friendly  and  shapely  bank 
of  hills.  Following  their  foot  from  Winchcomb  one 
soon  comes  in  touch  of  Hailes  Abbey,  whose  ruins, 
of  little  stature  now,  cover,  nevertheless,  a  large 
space  of  ground,  with  their  still  surviving  foundations, 
besides  part  of  a  tower  and  cloister,  and  an  ample 
tithe  barn  not  far  away.  The  situation,  close  into 
the  foot  of  the  hills,  is  characteristic  of  the  skill  with 
which  the  monks  usually  chose  their  sites.  The 
Cistercians  were  responsible  for  this  one,  and  the 
necessary  funds  were  contributed  in  1246  by  Richard, 
the  younger  brother  of  Henry  HI,  on  the  strength  of 
a  vow  made  while  in  peril  at  sea.  This  was  no  cell,  nor 
second-rate  establishment,  like  Fladburyand  others,  but 
it  was  dedicated  by  the  Bishop  of  Worcester,  assisted 
by  thirteen  other  bishops  in  the  presence  of  Henry  HI 
and  his  queen,  supported  by  three  hundred  knights 
and  noblemen,  and  its  chief  was  a  mitred  abbot. 

It  is  said  that  the  brethren  worked  a  clever  and  very 
profitable  miracle  here  by  means  of  a  crystal  repre- 
sented as  containing  some  of  Christ's  blood.  The 
victim  was  told  that  if  guilty  of  deadly  sin,  and  con- 
sequently unable  to  see  the  blood,  he  was  not  absolved, 
but  if  successful  in  seeing  it  he  had  no  cause  for 
anxiety  or  expenditure.  At  the  closing  of  the  monas- 
tery the  clever  trick  was  exposed,  for  the  crystal,  it 
appears,  had  a  thick  and  a  thin  side,  of  course  not 
evident  to  the  ordinary  eye.  Some  duck's  blood  was 
introduced  weekly  and  the  beatific  vision  was  turned 
off  or  on  at  will  by  the  priest  in  charge.  The  astute- 
ness of  this  arrangement  as  a  means  of  raising  money 
in  that  guileless  period  is  surely  entitled  to  the  fullest 
admiration.     The  remains  of  the  abbey  are  fenced  in 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  129 

and  well  protected,  though  as  a  mere  spectacle  very 
little  remains.  Of  the  foundations  and  materials  for 
those  interested  in  archaeology  there  is,  however,  a 
great  deal,  due  apparently  to  the  enterprising  excava- 
tions of  the  county  archaeological  society. 

Two  miles  beyond,  and  hugging  the  leafy  slope 
of  the  hills,  is  Stanway,  Lord  Elcho's  seat,  which 
came  into  the  Wemyss  family  by  marriage  in  times 
long  past.  The  house  is  worthy  of  the  situation,  and 
the  situation  of  the  house,  and  more  could  hardly 
be  said,  while  the  place  derives  further  charm  from 
its  entire  seclusion  from  the  world.  A  fine  three- 
storied  gateway,  built  by  Inigo  Jones,  fronts  the 
highway.  Immediately  within  it  the  mellow  face  of 
the  fine  old  Tudor  mansion  looks  peacefully  over 
far-spreading  lawns,  shaded  with  magnificent  elms 
and  oaks,  while  in  one  corner  stands  the  parish 
church  adjoining  a  perfect  specimen  of  a  fifteenth 
century  tithe  barn.  Above  the  gables  and  chimneys 
of  the  mansion,  which  is  of  no  great  size  for  its 
class,  and  all  the  better  for  it,  rise  the  leafy  foot- 
hills of  the  Cotswolds.  It  is  occupied  for  a  por- 
tion of  the  year  and  is  not  shown.  Nor,  in  spite 
of  the  interest  every  old  house  must  always  have, 
is  it  a  "show  house"  as  regards  the  interior  in  the 
ordinary  sense  of  the  word.  I  was  glad,  however,  of 
the  opportunity  of  going  through  it  if  only  for  the  vast 
and  magnificent  Tudor  window  in  the  drawing-room, 
which  is  a  conspicuous  feature  from  without.  Like 
all  old  houses  continuously  inhabited  there  are  later 
additions.  The  grounds  in  the  rear  run  abruptly 
up  the  hill-side,  from  the  summit  of  which  descends 
a  rivulet,  and  among  the  pictures  in  the  house  is  a 
curious  one,  showing  the  characteristic  use  that  was 
made  of  this  stream  in  the  early  eighteenth  century. 
9 


I30  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

A  terrace  in  the  hill-side,  now  dry,  was  turned  into 
a  small  ornamental  pool  where  the  "  house  party  "  of 
the  day,  in  that  early  Georgian  garb,  always  so  incon- 
gruous to  our  eye  against  a  rural  background,  are 
boating  and  angling  with  that  quite  remarkable 
satisfaction  in  elementary  and  limited  pleasures 
which  apparently  distinguished  the  country-house 
visitor  of  the  period. 

The  road  for  some  distance  after  leaving  Stanway 
is  fringed  on  either  hand  by  the  stately  timber  of  the 
park,  and  one  has  not  long  passed  out  of  its  shade 
when  the  beautiful  little  hill-foot  village  of  Stanford 
clasps  the  highway  with  a  brief  succession  of  varied 
and  most  attractive  specimens  of  Cotswold  architecture, 
characteristic  in  ample  fronts  and  gable  ends  of  yellow- 
ish grey  stone  and  in  flagged  roofs,  all  of  that  rich  com- 
plexion so  hopeless  of  description  by  any  mere  paint- 
box terms.  And  at  the  farther  end  of  the  village, 
all  exposed  to  view,  with  large  terraced  lawns  stretch- 
ing to  the  roadside,  is  Stanford  Court,  a  more  actually 
beautiful  house  than  Stanway.  At  something  of  an 
angle,  as  seen  from  the  passing  road,  it  displays  quite 
a  forest  of  Tudor  gables  and  chimneys.  Two  broad 
wings  with  wide  gables  are  thrown  forward  from  the 
front  with  apparently  Queen  Anne  or  Georgian  win- 
dows of  later  date,  and  the  central  portion,  of  three 
stories,  terminates  in  four  narrow  gables  ;  the  two  inner 
ones,  with  the  walls  they  surmount  recessed  yet 
farther,  and  the  whole  lit  with  stone -muUioned  win- 
dows, make  a  beautiful  picture,  gracefully  planted  on 
a  verdant  carpet  and  adequately  supported  and  over- 
shadowed on  the  flanks  and  rear  by  stately  trees. 

We  must  not  pursue  the  road  to  Broadway,  as  we 
are  due  there  later.  A  sharp  turn  to  the  left  out  of 
the  village,  making  a  slightly  capricious  choice  among 


BELOW  THE  COTS  WOLDS  131 

several  twisting  ways  to  Evesham,  terminates  after 
three   or    four   miles   at    Sedgebarrow,  which  stands 
on  that  main  road  between  the   two    abbey  towns, 
which  we  forsook  for  more  devious  but  more  alluring 
ways  at  an  early  stage.     Of  these  winding  byways, 
leading  from  village  to  village,  or  sometimes  having 
no  apparent  motive  but  to  give  an  alternate  route 
to  some  neighbouring  main  road,  there  is  great  store. 
Their  fences  are  not  often  the  object  of  much  solicitude 
at  the  hands  of  the  road  authorities,  and  in  no  country 
that  I  have  seen  are  the  roadsides    more  profusely 
decked  with  wild  flowers.     This    is    natural   enough 
in  one  that  responds  so  generously  to  the  cultivation 
of  fruit  and  flowers  as  to  set  up  a  claim,  more  sensible 
than  most,  to  be   "  the  garden  of  England ".     But 
in  the  untrimmed  fences,  the  choked  ditches,  and  the 
grassy  margins  of  roads  beyond  the  immediate  ken 
of  the  fruit-grower,  there  is  constant  comfort  to  such 
eyes  as  are  happily  able  to  find  comfort  in  things  so 
simple  and  so  accessible.     While  innumerable  motors 
hurtle  on  their  dust-enveloped  way  along  the  main 
road  from  Stratford  to  Evesham  and  from  Evesham 
to  Tewkesbury,  there  are  hundreds  of  miles  of  unmol- 
ested by-ways  between  the  Cotswolds  and  the  Avon 
and    beyond    it,  where  peace    nearly  always  reigns, 
and  the  intermittent  dust -blizzard  has  left  no  mark 
of   its   frenzy   upon   the   luxuriant   hedgerows.     The 
briar  roses  by  July  have  begun  to  scatter  their  petals 
before  every  rude  breath  of  wind.     But  the  honeysuckle 
and  the  trailing  convolvulus  are  braiding  the  motley 
tangle  of  thorn  and  maple,  elm  and  ash,  and  a  half- 
score  of  other  woods  that  go  to  make  that  beautiful 
and  quite  unique  contrivance — an  English  hedgerow, 
always  at  its  best  in  the  Midlands  and  West  Midlands. 
But  here  in  the  Avon  valley,  the  willow  herb  with 


132  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

its  waving  leafy  stem  and  serried  ranks  of  crimson 
flowers,  called  in  these  parts,  for  some  inscrutable 
reason,  "  coddled  apples ",  takes  easily  first  place. 
Nowhere  else  have  I  seen  it,  whether  on  river-bank 
or  on  highway  hedgerows  in  such  continuous  pro- 
fusion. The  meadow-sweet,  too,  is  with  us,  wherever 
a  patch  of  damp  gives  it  an  excuse  to  flourish,  and 
the  loose-strife,  the  wild  vetch,  the  crane's-foot,  the 
corn-flower,  the  scabious,  the  yarrow,  and  the  whole 
tribe  of  other  hedgerow  flowers,  common  enough 
and  lightly  spoken  of,  but  old  friends  that  we  should 
sadly  miss,  even  to  the  despised  cow  parsley  and  the 
dandelion.  One  lacks  here,  to  be  sure,  the  ferns  and 
foxgloves  of  wild  Wales  and  the  Border,  but  the  road 
edges  of  this  gentler  region  are  made  for  hospitality 
and  for  the  cherishing  of  every  vagrant  seed  that 
drifts  its  way  on  the  wings  of  the  wind.  The  flower- 
ing elder,  which  is  very  abundant  in  this  generous 
country,  seems  to  be  of  a  more  ivory  whiteness  than 
common,  and  again  and  again  in  bright  sunshine 
almost  to  renew  at  midsummer  and  later  the  departed 
glories  of  the  May  and  blackthorn. 

But  at  Sedgebarrow,  as  already  noted,  we  are  on 
a  main  route  again  given  over,  though  not  so 
utterly  as  some  of  its  more  easterly  stages,  to  the 
frenzies  of  the  modern  traveller  and  the  whirling 
tourist  on  his  way  to  Tewkesbury,  Cheltenham,  or 
the  Land's  End.  But  there  need  be  no  occasion  what- 
ever for  the  explorer  of  the  shy  charms  of  the  vale 
of  Evesham,  or  of  Cotswold,  or  of  Avon,  whichever 
you  choose  to  call  it,  to  fall  foul  of  persons  whose 
methods  of  exploration  are  of  another  kind.  Dc 
gustibus  non  est  disfutandum. 

Sedgebarrow,  happily  for  itself  as  things  have  turned 
out,  stands  well  back  from  the  main  road  and  upon 


BELOW  THE  COTSWOLDS  133 

the  Isbourne,  a  tributary  of  the  Avon,  whose  infant 
streams,  if  indeed  they  can  ever  be  said  to  reach 
maturity,  we  crossed,  with  deplorable  negligence  at 
Winchcomb.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  the  same 
little  rivulet  that  created  that  early  Georgian  pond 
above  Stanway  Hall,  in  which  gorgeous  wights,  it 
may  be  remembered,  angled  in  the  old  picture  with 
gorgeous  ladies  who  no  doubt  were  the  real  quarry, 
I  confess  to  small  enthusiasm  for  the  tributaries  of 
the  Avon.  You  must  be  a  Midlander,  and  that  of 
a  very  precious  type,  or  else  a  fi.rst-flighter,  with  the 
Quorn  or  Pytchley,  to  appreciate  a  Midland  brook, 
though  here  and  there  some  effort  of  man  or  miller 
may  provide  it  with  redeeming  intervals.  Its  chief 
mission  seems  to  lie  in  unobtrusively  nourishing 
the  parent  river.  In  summer,  at  any  rate,  you  will 
quite  possibly  pass  it  unawares,  and  if  not,  there  is 
small  temptation  to  linger  on  the  bridge  beneath 
which  its  attenuated  voiceless  waters  creep. 

The  village  of  Sedgebarrow,  though  not  devoid  of 
half-timbered  houses,  for  we  are  already  out  of  the 
Cotswold  style,  is  of  no  particular  interest.  But 
the  church  boasts  a  good  deal,  though  unknowingly 
you  might  well  pass  it  by  like  the  brook.  The  vicar, 
an  ecclesiologist  of  some  distinction,  saved  me  from 
this  indiscretion,  had  the  chance  of  committing  it 
been  afforded  me.  A  sexagonal  tower  would,  one 
might  imagine,  give  any  one  pause  who  had  an  ele- 
mentary eye  for  a  church.  But  otherwise  this  one 
both  inside  and  out  is  a  plain  parallelogram.  The 
vicar  promised,  however,  to  show  me  two  curiosities 
at  least  that  had  not  their  like  in  England.  The  one 
proved  to  be  a  very  singular  old  screen  of  two  stories, 
and  a  mere  plain  open  framework.  I  have  never 
myself  seen  anything  like   it,  in  a  reasonably  wide 


134  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

experience,  but  the  vicar's  conviction,  as  an  expert, 
that  it  is  unique  is  no  doubt  worth  more  than  that. 
The  other  was  a  curious  stained  window  in  the  chancel, 
depicting  a  bishop  holding  in  his  hand  the  model 
of  a  church, — the  very  church  in  which  we  stood, — 
of  the  Decorated  style,  and  completed  in  the  year 
1331.  I  am  not  sure  that  the  nature  of  the  illustra- 
tion is  without  parallel  in  a  country  church,  but  in 
this  case  a  contemporary  document  exists  describing 
in  full  the  dedication,  and  the  two  facts  taken  to- 
gether entitle  the  window  to  the  exceptional  claim 
its  learned  vicar  makes  for  it.  Sedgebarrow  parish, 
by  the  way,  may  almost  be  called,  one  of  that  archi- 
pelago of  islands  with  which  Worcestershire  sprinkles 
its  neighbours,  as  you  might  almost  throw  a  stone 
across  the  narrow  thread  which  holds  it.  And  so 
to  Evesham,  through  Worcestershire  for  most  of 
the  way,  leaving  Hinton,  with  its  rectory  embowered 
in  foliage  and  its  Gothic  church  set  on  a  green  knoll 
upon  the  left.  A  dull,  flat  road  henceforth,  if  the 
truth  must  be  told,  and  not  unsuited  for  the  race- 
track it  threatens  to  become,  nor  much  to  be 
grudged  as  such,  if  the  market-gardeners  and  the 
fruit-growers,  whose  outcries  just  then  were  loud  and 
bitter,  do  not  mind.  I  paused  one  day  at  a  gate  in 
the  road  where  the  carts  were  loading  the  produce 
of  a  20-acre  field  of  strawberries,  and  the  overseer 
was  checking  the  contributions  of  the  fifty  or  sixty 
pickers,  women  mostly,  paid  by  the  basket,  who  came 
and  went.  Volumes  of  dust  falling  upon  ripe  straw- 
berries can  be  pictured  in  effect  without  any  realistic 
illustrations  of  it  here.  My  foreman  friend  was  very 
eloquent — a  consignment  had  just  been  smothered. 
He  wanted  to  know  why  people  from  "  God  knows 
where"  (that  mouth-filling  limit  to  concentrated  local 


BELOW  THE  COTS  WOLDS  135 

scorn)  to  whom  it  could  not  be  other  than  a  matter  of 
trifling  moment  whether  they  went  by  his  ripening  crop 
at  ten  or  thirty  miles  an  hour,  should  nearly  always 
approximate  to  the  latter  ;  and  why  the  quality  of 
produce,  raised  with  so  much  risk,  labour,  and  expendi- 
ture, should  be  thus  superfluously  blighted  by  a  set 
of — well,  never  mind  what  names  he  called,  there  was 
safety  to  them,  at  any  rate,  in  numbers.     He  was 
a   sporting-looking   person,   and   he   put   the   further 
postulate  of  what  a  chorus  of  condemnation  would 
be  used  towards  an  individual  in  the  hunting-field  who 
pounded  about  in  soft  weather  on  seeds  or  wheat. 
Two  good  reasons  at  once  sprang  to  mind  :  the  one 
a  little  subtle,  perhaps,  for  this  honest  young  farmer, 
the   other   obvious   to   a   child.     It   would   not   have 
been  much  use  to  point  out  that  the  power  of  dis- 
tinguishing   between    seeds    and    pastures,    acquired 
perhaps  laboriously  and  even  unpleasantly  by  many 
a  hunting-tenant  of  the  shires,  was  a  precious  bit  of 
agricultural  lore,  a  kind   of  sporting  hall-mark  that 
it  was  humiliating  to  be  without.     But  this  measure 
of  interest  in  agriculture  would  likely  begin  and  end 
there.     The  hunting  stockbroker  and  his  lady  from 
Northamptonshire,  killing    time    thuswise  in  the  off- 
season, would  rarely,  I  am  quite  certain,  extend  their 
solicitude  to  summer  crops  in  a  strange  land,  though 
one  can  hear  them  shouting,  "  Ware  seeds  "  to  a  later 
recruit  of  the  Pytchley  with  immense  authority  and  all 
the  air  of  persons  brought  up  on  a  farm. 

But  then,  as  I  pointed  out  to  my  friend,  their  amuse- 
ment would  come  to  an  end  if  they  didn't,  whereas 
the  amusement  of  hurtling  at  twenty-five  miles  an 
hour  through  his  strawberries  or  other  growing 
produce  is  never  likely  to  be  sensibly  checked.  There 
is  nothing  to  check  it  but  human  sympathy  and  know- 


136  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

ledge  of  country  affairs,  and  the  latter  qualifications 
at  least  cannot  be  expected  of  a  class,  the  great  and 
growing  majority  of  whom  in  this  industrial  country 
are  out  of  touch  with  practical  rural  life,  while  as  for 
a  kind  heart,  no  one  would  be  fool  enough  to  put  de- 
pendence on  so  abstract  a  virtue.  At  any  rate,  I  could 
not  suppress  the  thought  that  if  his  welfare  depended 
on  the  common  sense  or  consideration  of  the  ram- 
paging chauffeur  or  Cockney  amateur,  there  was  a 
mighty  poor  show,  and  I  take  it  he  would  be  a  Simple 
Simon  who  thought  otherwise,  motorists  being  very 
much  like  other  mortals,  mainly  bent  on  their  own 
pleasure,  and  hustling  for  all  they  are  worth  to  get 
it.  Killing  wayfarers  is  risky,  but  nothing  else  matters 
a  rap  ;  why  should  it  ?  The  devil  take  the  hindmost 
is  written  tolerably  large  over  the  opening  of  the 
twentieth  century,  and  would  make  an  admirable 
motto  with  which  to  head  it  for  the  next  historian 
who  undertakes  to  write  a  "  History  of  Our  Own 
Times  ". 


BELL   TOWER,   EVESHA_AI 


CHAPTER   V 
THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM 

EVESHAM,  as  stated  in  a  former  chapter,  is  par- 
ticularly happy  in  its  approach  from  this  left 
bank  of  the  river.  As  you  cross  the  modern  bridge, 
successor  to  an  ancient  one  that  saw  much  service  in 
peace  and  war,  from  Bengeworth,  a  straggling  suburb, 
the  old  town  which  grew  from  an  abbey  stands  well 
planted  on  a  ridge  within  the  wide  horse-shoe  formed 
by  the  stream.  Down  the  broad,  straight  course  of 
the  Avon,  from  the  bridge  towards  the  woods  and 
upstanding  church  of  Hampton,  public  spirit  has 
been  active  in  making  the  most  of  a  river  that  lends 
itself  readily  to  the  further  beautifying  of  such  towns 
and  villages  as  are  washed  by  its  classic  streams. 
From  the  ridge  of  the  town  on  one  side  a  pleasant 
meadow  slopes  to  its  banks,  where  boathouses  of  some 
ambition  have  both  a  cheerful  and  a  business-like 
appearance,  as  is  fitting  at  a  point  whence  really 
good  boating  can  be  enjoyed  over  many  miles  of  most 
attractive  water.  Here,  too,  the  little  steamers  from 
Tewkesbury  finish  their  journey  and  discharge  or 
take  on  their  passengers.  On  the  farther  shore, 
thanks  to  the  generosity  of  a  former  citizen,  what 
were  once  brushy  islands,  or  aits,  in  the  local  tongue, 
are  now  public  gardens,  which  in  the  course  of  nearly 
half  a  century  have  become  beautifully  shaded  stretches 
of  lawn  that  dip  their  velvety  banks  into  the  brimming 


138  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

stream.  The  pictures  of  the  old  bridge  show  it  to 
have  been  one  of  the  most  picturesque  on  the  Avon, 
with  the  signs  of  the  destruction  and  repair  wrought 
in  the  Civil  War  obvious  upon  it.  The  present  one, 
also  of  stone,  is  really  handsome  and  harmonious, 
for  which  Evesham  may  be  thankful,  having  regard 
to  the  monstrosities  which  advertise  the  scientific 
progress  of  the  engineer  on  many  a  beautiful  river. 

The  particular  object,  however,  which  gives  a  touch 
of  real  dignity  to  the  otherwise  pleasant  view  of  the 
town,  is  the  beautiful  Tudor  bell-tower,  the  sole  relic 
of  that  famous  abbey  which  once  grouped  its  many 
noble  buildings  on  the  green-breasted  ridge  above 
the  river.  Here  to-day  the  most  recently  erected 
of  these  stands  in  conspicuous  and  stately  isolation, 
and  just  behind,  girt  about  with  elms,  are  the  two  old 
parish  churches,  set  to  the  stranger's  eye  in  most 
perplexing  juxtaposition.  But  the  good  Abbot 
Lichfield's  belfry,  barely  completed  when  the  crash 
came,  is  the  real  note  of  Evesham  and  the  just  pride 
of  its  people,  who  otherwise  fared  even  worse  than 
their  neighbours  of  Tewkesbury  and  Pershore  at  the 
hand  of  the  iconoclast  and  the  spoliator.  As  at  Per- 
shore and  again  at  Tewkesbury,  the  precincts  stand 
just  outside  the  western,  or  rather  the  south-western, 
limit  of  the  town  and  can  be  regarded  f'-om  outside 
as  a  spectacle  unto  themselves  over  a  foreground  of 
meadow  and  foliage,  or  from  another  point  as  rising 
above  the  gables  of  the  town  they  gave  birth  to. 
No  description  of  an  old  town  from  the  wanderer's  or 
his  reader's  point  of  view  is  ever  quite  in  order  without 
a  brief  prologue  from  old  Leland,  whose  diction  and 
spelHng  make  of  themselves  what  is  really  and  of 
intention  the  driest  topographical  book  ever  written 
seem  a  constant  joy  if  taken  in  small  doses.     "  The 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        139 

town  of  Evesham  is  meetly  large  and  well  builded  with 
tymbre.  The  market  place  is  fay  re  and  large.  There 
be  diverse  praty  streets  in  the  towne.  The  market 
is  very  celebrated.  In  the  towne  is  noe  hospital 
or  other  famous  foundation  but  the  late  Abbey  ". 

This  one  of  Evesham  is  no  less  pleasant  to  look 
upon  than  the  other  Avon  towns  above  and  below. 
It  has  been  more  tried  aesthetically  from  the  prosperity 
occasioned  by  the  rapid  development  of  fruit-growing 
in  recent  times  and  a  consequent  activity  in  bricks 
and  mortar,  which  has  not  greatly  influenced  the  others. 
But  it  has  survived  the  ordeal  tolerably  well,  and 
still  remains  a  pleasant  and  sightly  little  town,  good  to 
look  upon  and  cheerful  to  move  about  in.  A  long, 
narrow,  old-fashioned  main  street  drags  itself  up  from 
the  bridge  to  the  top  of  the  plateau  where  is  a  spacious 
market-place,  with  several  old  half-timbered  houses 
conspicuous  around  it,  among  them  the  fine  detached 
sixteenth  century  Booth  hall,  a  double-gabled  building 
with  a  projecting  third  story.  Beyond  the  southern 
end  of  the  market-place  rise  the  churches  among  their 
elm  trees,  marking  the  entrance  to  the  old  abbey 
precincts,  while  to  the  west  of  this  again  spreads  a 
large  green,  around  which  are  various  buildings, 
among  them  an  ancient  house  noticeable  for  its 
Tudor  porch.  This  is  the  free  grammar  school  char- 
tered by  James  I,  standing  on  the  site  of  an  older 
one  built  by  the  last  abbot,  Clement  Lichfield.  The 
porch  indeed  belongs  to  this  earlier  building  and  still 
wears  the  rather  illegible  inscription  :  Orate  pro  anima 
dementis  abbas.  But  a  still  more  interesting  house 
stands  in  the  corner  near  the  abbey  precincts,  which 
was  actually  the  almonry  of  the  abbey  and  therefore 
of  fifteenth  century  date.  It  displays  a  conspicuous 
mullioned    five-light    window    without    transoms    in 


I40  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

the  front,  and  contains  within  a  good  deal  of  interesting 
Tudor  work. 

Returning  to  the  heart  of  the  town  where  Bridge 
Street,  which,  among  other  old  houses,  exhibits  the 
fine  old-fashioned  open  courtyard  of  the  "  Crown  Inn  ", 
meets  the  market-place,  the  High  Street  runs  north- 
ward for  a  considerable  distance.  If  contrasts  give 
character  to  a  town,  as  they  surely  do,  that  exhibited 
by  the  narrow  dimensions  of  the  older  street  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  generous  proportions  of  the  newer 
one  on  the  other,  should  be  to  the  credit  of  Evesham. 
For  here  we  have  a  business  highway  of  almost  market- 
place span  and  withal  bordered  pleasantly  by  trees 
upon  either  side.  This  has  a  more  modern  air,  and 
I  do  not  propose  to  catalogue  the  old  houses  that 
suggest  a  mellower  one,  either  in  this  or  other  streets 
of  Evesham,  for  a  more  purposeless  proceeding  in 
anything  but  a  guide-book,  or  one  more  calculated  to 
alienate  the  most  patient  reader  I  cannot  imagine. 
But  there  is  here  a  singularly  perfect  three-storied 
specimen  of  the  Queen  Anne  style,  known  as 
Dresden  House  ;  dignified  to  a  fault,  from  the  wide, 
well-moulded  eaves  to  the  square  porch-roof  supported 
by  fine  flowing  brackets  of  wrought  iron.  The  house 
has  some  personal  interest  too,  in  having  been  the 
abode  of  one  Dr.  Baylis,  who,  getting  into  trouble  with 
his  creditors,  went  to  Dresden  and  eventually  rose  to 
be  physician  to  Frederick  the  Great. 

Evesham,  through  its  abbey  origin,  acquires  its  name 
from  a  romantic  incident  known  as  the  "Vision  of 
Eoves".  In  the  year  701  a  sow, belonging  to  Egwin, 
Bishop  of  Worcester,  had  gone  astray  with  her  litter, 
and  Eoves,  one  of  his  swineherds,  after  vainly  ranging 
the  forest,  at  length  discovered  the  happy  family  curled 
up  in  a  thicket  by  a  ruinous  cell,  which  tradition  held 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        141 

to  be  an  old  Celtic  church.  As  the  immediate  depend- 
ent of  a  bishop,  Eoves  may  be  presumed  to  have  been 
properly  susceptible  to  the  sacred  atmosphere  of  the 
spot  and  immediately  saw  a  vision,  which  took  the 
form  of  three  beautiful  women  all  singing,  the  Virgin  in 
the  middle,  and  promptly  ran  for  his  life.  But  when  he 
reported  the  adventure  to  his  master,  the  good  bishop's 
curiosity  was  so  aroused  that  he  himself  hied  to  the 
lonely  spot  and  had  precisely  the  same  weird  experi- 
ence as  his  swineherd.  Exalted  by  the  miraculous  en- 
counter, Egwin  with  as  little  delay  as  possible  founded 
a  Benedictine  monastery  there,  and  later  on  gave  up 
being  a  bishop  to  become  its  first  abbot — a  sacrifice,  if 
any,  by  no  means  so  great  as  a  twentieth  century 
reader  might  be  disposed  to  imagine.  Eoves  found 
immortal  and  unexpected  fame  in  the  bad  fright  he  had 
undergone,  for  the  monastery  was  solemnly  named 
Eoves-ham.  This  venture  of  the  bishop's  was  not 
unnaturally  regarded  with  a  jealous  eye  in  the 
cathedral  circles  of  Worcester,  and  men  began  to 
torture  the  good  prelate  by  spreading  such  scandalous 
and  unfounded  stories  about  him  that  nothing,  he 
thought,  but  a  journey  in  person  to  Rome  could  avail 
to  clear  his  character.  Determined  to  wash  himself 
whiter  than  snow  in  the  eyes  of  the  Church  and  to 
leave  his  traducers  no  leg  to  stand  upon,  he  manacled 
his  own  together  with  a  lock  and  key,  and  having 
thrown  the  key  into  the  Avon  started  for  Italy, 
intimating  his  full  faith  that  Heaven,  when  it  saw  fit, 
would  relieve  them  of  the  astounding  inconvenience. 
Heaven,  however,  took  no  steps  to  liberate  the  good 
bishop's  legs  till  he  contrived  by  some  unrecorded 
method  of  progress  to  reach  the  Holy  City.  Here,  on 
purchasing  a  salmon  for  his  table,  when  it  was  cut  open, 
the  key  to  his  happy  release,  and  the  utter  confounding 


142  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of  his  enemies,  was  found  inside  it.  The  Avon  fish, 
in  short,  had  brought  the  key  by  sea  to  meet  the 
bishop  on  his  arrival  by  land.  It  will  be  noted  that 
the  story  grows  in  daring  as  it  advances,  and  culminates 
in  a  delightful  outrage  on  ichthyology.  The  bells  of 
Rome,  too,  rang  of  their  own  accord,  and  the  Pope 
was  so  impressed  by  such  a  marvellous  testimony  to 
Egwin's  innocence,  that  he  gave  him  all  sorts  of 
privileges  for  his  monastery  and,  most  valued  of  all, 
freedom  from  the  control  of  the  Worcester  episcopate. 
Here  legend  ends  and  history  begins,  for  the  reputa- 
tion of  the  canonized  Egwin  was  so  great  that  his  bones 
and  his  shrine  amassed  wealth  for  the  abbey  through 
the  contributions  of  innumerable  pilgrims,  while 
Saxon  kings  and  thegns  sought  to  mitigate  their 
truculent  deeds  and  improve  a  poor  prospect  of 
Paradise  by  loading  it  with  farms  and  manors.  As 
time  went  on,  succeeding  abbots  qualified  as  saints, 
and  the  miracles  which  had  distinguished  their  lives 
and  been  worked  by  their  remains  were  sedulously 
proclaimed  throughout  the  Midlands  and  the  west,  and 
made  Eoves-ham  popular  among  pilgrims  and  pros- 
perous above  the  common  among  abbeys.  Its  rivalry 
with  Worcester,  further  embittered  by  its  grant  of 
release  from  episcopal  jurisdiction,  was  intense. 
For  Worcester  had  bred  saints  in  Oswald  and  Wulfstan 
second  to  none,  as  is  well  known.  The  latter,  the  one 
great  Saxon  bishop  who  retained  his  power  and 
influence  through  the  Norman  Conquest  and  his  own 
long  life,  exceeded  all  the  saints  of  Worcestershire  in 
the  opinion  of  his  staff  in  that  culminating  act  of  self- 
mortifying  piety  when  he  celebrated  masses  for  the 
repose  of  the  soul  of  a  deceased  abbot  of  Evesham. 
Then  of  a  truth  it  was  thought  at  Worcester  that  he 
had  overdone  it,  and  when  the  liberal-minded  cleric 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        143 

almost  immediately  was  taken  with  the  very  disease 
that  had  laid  his  rival  low,  he  began  to  think  so  himself, 
and  registered  a  vow  never  again  to  make  spiritual 
intercession  for  "  such  men  ",  upon  which  he  got  well. 

The  wealth  of  Evesham  had  received  a  heavy  check 
at  the  hand  of  Edward  the  Confessor,  who  despoiled 
the  Worcestershire  houses  of  large  estates  for  the 
benefit  of  his  new  foundation  at  Westminster.  It  had 
before  this  suffered  all  kinds  of  vicissitudes  short  of 
actual  loss  of  importance,  and  continued  to  suffer 
many  more  :  Danes,  fires,  wars,  quarrels  with 
Worcester,  lawsuits  over  property.  At  the  Norman 
Conquest,  Evesham  had  a  Saxon  abbot  almost  rivalling 
Wulfstan  in  the  confidence  and  power  bestowed  on 
him  by  William.  But  he  was  a  shrewd  man  of  business 
and  got  the  best  of  the  saintly  Wulfstan,  even  to 
filching  some  land  from  Worcester.  Throughout 
the  Middle  Ages  the  Evesham  monastery  waxed,  its 
wealth  increased,  while  its  buildings,  enlarged  in  size 
and  beauty,  covered  a  great  area.  At  one  time  it  had 
nearly  seventy  monks  and  sixty  servants.  Besides  the 
abbot  who  sat  in  Parliament,  there  were  three  priors. 
The  powerful  Beauchamps  had  a  castle  at  Bengeworth, 
just  axross  the  river,  and  the  owner  of  the  moment  ven- 
turing to  take  liberties  with  awall  belonging  to  the  mon- 
astery, was  immediately  excommunicated  by  the  abbot 
who,  not  finding  this  a  sufficient  corrective,  proceeded 
to  the  more  drastic  one  of  destroying  the  castle  itself. 

This  is  merely  an  instance  of  the  secular  power, 
when  driven  to  exercise  it,  of  the  abbots  of  Evesham. 
Tlie  brethren  were  of  course  great  gardeners  and 
horticulturists.  It  is  a  pleasant  tradition  among  the 
people  of  Evesham  that  the  monks  were  the  founders 
of  the  industry  for  which  the  town  and  neighbourhood 
is  to-day  famous.     The  dark,  rich  soil  in  the  immediate 


144  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

precincts  of  the  vanished  abbey  is  at  this  moment  a 
bright  scene  of  fruit  and  flowers,  and  one  may  indulge 
the  fancy  that  in  these  pleasant  retreats  of  latter-day 
occupants  there  are  plants  and  trees  that  trace  their 
descent  to  a  far-away  monkish  origin.  Vineyard  Hill, 
just  across  the  river,  whither  Evesham  Joes  and  Jills 
wend  their  way  by  the  picturesque  rope-ferry  at  Hamp- 
ton on  summer  Sundays,  is  a  memory  of  the  vine  cul- 
ture in  which  the  Records  tell  us  the  monks  had  five 
men  regularly  employed.  The  collectanea  of  Evesham 
Abbey  are  full  and  interesting  and  sometimes  lively 
reading.  It  will  be  enough  here  to  endorse  the  natural 
inference  that  there  were  good  and  bad  abbots,  that 
some  of  the  good  were  very  good  indeed,  and  some  of 
the  bad  incredible  ill-doers,  though  the  last  seem  happily 
to  have  been  great  exceptions. 

One  of  them.  Abbot  Roger,  at  the  opening  of  the 
thirteenth  century,  was  both  tyrant  and  libertine,  and 
was  apparently  thrust  into  office  by  the  Crown.  He 
stinted  the  brethren  of  this  great  and  wealthy  house 
so  cruelly  that  they  had  to  beg  their  bread  through 
the  country,  some  of  them  even  dying  of  starvation, 
while  he  himself  rioted  in  luxury.  He  kept  them  so 
short  of  clothes  that  they  had  to  come  to  church  in  rags 
or  stay  away,  while  the  abbot  went  clad  in  purple  and 
fine  linen,  and  even  denied  them  fires  in  the  coldest 
weather.  Structural  repairs  were  so  neglected  that 
leaking  roofs  in  some  quarters  made  devotion  im- 
possible. Even  the  traditional  hospitalities  of  the 
house  were  curtailed,  and  all  this,  too,  that  the  revenues 
might  be  alienated  for  the  private  uses  of  the  wicked 
abbot,  who  broke  every  canonical  rule,  and  of  his 
relatives.  Worse  than  all,  perhaps,  he  betrayed  the 
stubbornly  maintained  independence  of  the  abbey 
by  secretly  making  terms  with  its  natural  enemy  the 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        145 

Bishop  of  Worcester,  and  admitting  him  as  visitor  and 
Superior.  The  bishop  made  the  most  of  so  unexpected 
an  opportunity  by  at  once  excommunicating  the 
entire  community  except  the  abbot,  a  proceeding 
in  its  secular  brutahty  wholly  humorous,  in  view  of 
the  traditional  rivalry  of  Worcester  and  Evesham. 
After  twenty-three  years  of  this  oppression,  the 
brethren  were  eventually  relieved  by  the  courageous 
energy  of  their  dean,  Marleburg,  who,  under  inconceiv- 
able difficulties,  carried  the  whole  matter  personally  to 
the  Pope,  and  ultimately  the  infamous  Abbot  Roger 
was  ejected. 

Of  the  many  good  abbots  the  last  of  all,  Clement 
Lichfield,  is  best  remembered  to-day  for  the  memorial 
he  has  left  us.  This  good  man,  when  the  Dissolution 
burst  upon  him,  had  not  actually  put  the  finishing 
touches  to  the  work  by  which  he  hoped  to  complete 
the  architectural  glory  of  his  beloved  monastery, 
little  thinking  it  would  be  the  sole  survivor  of  it. 
Apart  from  his  devotion  to  the  abbey  the  further 
merits  of  Clement  Lichfield  lay  in  his  stout  refusal  to 
be  the  instrument  of  handing  it  over  to  the  secular 
powers  and  thereby  securing  that  provision  for  the 
future,  which  compliance  with  the  king's  demand 
alone  ensured  him.  He  was  in  consequence  deposed 
and  a  young  monk  instituted  for  the  mere  purpose 
of  performing  the  needful  formalities  in  the  melan- 
choly act  of  surrender,  at  the  price  of  a  pension  and  a 
deanery.  Long  before  the  Dissolution  the  king  had 
extorted  large  sums  of  money  from  Evesham,  while 
Wolsey  had  periodically  levied  his  own  private  black- 
mail. It  is  difficult  to  realize  that  the  solitary  Gothic 
arch,  a  few  feet  high  and  a  few  yards  to  the  southward 
along  the  crest  of  the  river-slope  from  the  bell-tower, 
is  the  only  remnant  of  a  mighty  cruciform  church  of 


146  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

nave,  chancel,  great  central  tower,  and  transepts, 
which  measured  from  its  lady  chapel  to  its 
west  door  more  than  350  feet.  Around  it  were 
grouped  numerous  chantries ;  in  all  parts  of  it 
were  splendid  tombs,  while  beyond  rose  the  cloisters 
and  the  numerous  buildings  of  the  monastery.  Thus, 
in  whole  or  part,  had  a  group  of  great  and  stately 
buildings  looked  down  for  four  centuries  upon  the 
Avon  brimming  at  the  foot  of  this  long  grassy  slope. 
For  as  many  centuries  before  that  again,  their  ruder 
predecessors,  whatever  may  have  been  their  form,  had 
stood  upon  the  same  site,  one  among  the  greatest  of 
English  abbeys.  Freeman  tells  us  how,  after  the 
devastating  hand  of  William  of  Normandy  had  fallen 
upon  Cheshire  and  Shropshire  as  a  punishment  for 
insubordination,  crowds  of  starving  people  from  those 
counties  thronged  the  streets  and  precincts  of  Evesham, 
and  how  Abbot  Egwin  fed  the  hungry,  ministered  to 
the  dying,  and  buried  the  dead.  Yet  in  the  sixteenth 
century  the  whole  glorious  fabric,  the  cathedral-like 
church  with  chapels,  altars,  monuments,  cloisters,  and 
monastic  buildings,  the  product  of  centuries  of  zealous 
and  skilful  labour,  was  converted  into  a  stone  quarry, 
and  in  a  short  space  levelled  with  the  ground. 

Probably,  however,  the  most  dramatic  moment  in 
the  life  of  the  monastery  was  when  Simon  de  Montfort, 
with  Henry  HI  as  a  hostage,  lay  there  for  the  night 
preceding  the  battle  of  Evesham,  and  with  his  nobles 
and  knights  attended  mass  at  the  high  altar,  before 
marching  out  to  what  proved  for  them  so  disastrous  a 
field.  De  Montfort  was  at  the  moment  marching  from 
the  Welsh  border  to  unite  his  forces  with  those  of  his 
son,  who  lay  at  Kenilworth.  Prince  Edward  and  the 
Royalist  army  lay  at  Worcester,  whence  they  executed 
a  rapid  march  on  Kenilworth,  defeated  the  younger 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        147 

de  Montfort,  captured  a  portion  of  his  forces,  and  drove 
him  into  the  castle.  Thence,  quickly  turning,  they  fell 
back  down  the  Avon  upon  Evesham,  while  another 
wing  of  the  army  which  had  remained  at  Worcester 
pushed  up  that  river  from  Pershore  to  a  junction  with 
their  friends.  De  Montfort,  ignorant  of  his  son's  mis- 
fortune, was  first  made  cognizant  of  the  serious  nature 
of  his  position  by  the  evidence  of  his  own  eyes  on  that 
fateful  August  morning.  For  his  barber,  as  tradition 
has  it,  took  him  up  to  the  top  of  the  abbey  tower  and 
showed  him  the  gleaming  arms  and  waving  standards 
of  his  enemy  on  the  top  of  the  long  slope  above  Eves- 
ham, where  the  residential  suburb  of  the  town  has  of 
late  settled  itself. 

Nor  was  this  all,  for  the  other  division  had  seized  the 
south  bank  of  the  Avon  behind  him,  and  the  bridges 
of  Evesham  and  Off  enham,  which  were  his  only  channels 
of  retreat.  Thus  hopelessly  outnumbered,  the  grim  old 
soldier  gave  leave  to  any  of  his  nobles  who  might  feel 
so  inclined  to  steal  away  before  such  a  dismal  prospect. 
We  do  not  hear  how  many,  if  any,  flinched  from  it,  but 
only  of  those  that  stayed  with  the  gallant  foreigner 
who  had  acquired  such  singular  and,  one  cannot 
help  thinking,  slightly  adventitious  popularity  as  the 
champion  of  English  liberties.  They  went  bravely 
out,  at  any  rate,  to  meet  their  doom  on  the  long  slope 
to  the  north  of  the  town.  "  May  the  Lord  have  mercy 
on  our  souls,"  said  de  Montfort  as  he  led  on  his  army, 
"  for  our  bodies  are  the  enemies'  ".  No  quarter  was 
asked  or  given.  The  unexpected  did  not  happen  ; 
de  Montfort  fought  like  a  lion,  but  he  and  all  his  sup- 
porters were  killed,  wounded,  or  dispersed.  It  was  then 
that  Henry  cried  out  in  the  nick  of  time  to  a  common 
soldier,  who  was  about  to  dispatch  him,  "  Stay,  I  am 
Henry  of  Winchester,  your  king  ".    De  Montfort's  body 


148  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

was  quartered  and  the  extremities  cut  off.  Such  parts 
as  could  be  collected  by  the  pious  monks  of  Evesham 
were  buried  in  front  of  the  high  altar  of  the  abbey 
church,  and  repaid  them  a  hundredfold  by  the  miracles 
they  wrought  and  by  the  income  they  brought  to  the 
abbey  for  generations.  One  foot,  I  remember,  was 
carried  to  Northumberland,  where  the  earl  had  manors, 
and  proved  a  valuable  asset  to  the  monastery  of 
Alnwick,  whose  fine  old  gateway  still  stands  alone  in  a 
woody  glen  by  Aln's  banks.  De  Montfort  was  even 
greater  in  the  grave  than  he  had  been  in  the  camp, 
and  in  death  was  even  more  popular  than  in  life. 
Songs  were  written  to  his  glorious  memory  and  thou- 
sands offered  their  petitions  upon  his  tomb.  The 
place  where  he  and  his  followers  fought  and  fell  is  now 
covered  in  part  by  the  villas  of  prosperous  Evesham 
citizens  and  partly  by  the  private  grounds  of  the 
present  abbey  manor. 

Within  the  outer  precincts  of  the  vanished  abbey  is 
the  curious  spectacle  of  a  single  churchyard  containing 
two  churches.  The  entry  from  the  market-place  is 
through  a  twelfth  century  Norman  archway,  which 
supports  an  old  half-timbered  building  with  another 
structure  of  the  same  style,  and  very  effectively 
restored,  in  close  connexion  with  it.  The  first  of 
these  two  churches,  that  of  All  Saints,  was  reserved 
for  the  townsfolk,  the  other,  St.  Lawrence,  for  the 
pilgrims  to  the  abbey.  The  former  is  almost  wholly 
of  Perpendicular  character,  though  the  chancel  and 
north  aisle  are  modern  reproductions  of  it.  But 
the  chief  object  of  interest  is  the  Lichfield  chantry 
in  the  south  aisle,  the  work  of  that  incomparable 
and  pious  abbot,  last  of  his  line,  in  praise  of  whom 
something  was  said  on  a  former  page.  Here,  too, 
his   dust  reposes  beneath  an   exquisite  roof   of   fan- 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        149 

vaulting,  bearing  an  escutcheon  engraved  with  the 
initials  C.  L.  Some  well-executed  modern  windows, 
too,  have  been  placed  in  this  chantry  illustrating 
scenes  from  the  history  of  the  abbey. 

Near  at  hand,  in  the  same  pleasantly  shaded  church- 
yard, packed  with  old  gravestones,  is  the  rival  church 
of  St.  Lawrence,  a  much  more  striking  building,  though 
none  of  it  is  early,  the  tower  and  spire  being  accred- 
ited to  the  fifteenth  century,  and  the  rest  of  a  little 
later  date  but  flavouring  throughout  of  the  Tudor 
period.  It  is  unusually  interesting  on  this  account 
alone  and  extremely  graceful.  The  panelling  in  the 
space  between  the  nave  arches  and  the  clerestory 
is  as  effective  as  it  is  uncommon.  The  tracery,  too, 
of  the  vast  perpendicular  east  window  is  singularly 
rich.  A  good  deal  of  the  work  is  attributed  to  Abbot 
Lichfield  himself,  who  has  also  a  chantry  in  the  south 
aisle  of  this  second  church,  exhibiting  even  more 
exquisite  fan-tracery  in  its  roof  than  the  one  beneath 
which  the  creator  of  both  lies  buried.  Indeed,  it  is 
held  as  unsurpassed  of  its  kind  in  England.  These 
two  churches  now  represent  two  distinct  parishes, 
though  under  a  single  vicar.  As  they  were  not  a  part 
of  the  monastery  and  were,  moreover,  needed  for 
public  worship,  they  escaped  the  general  wreck.  The 
beautiful  and  lofty  tower,  however,  standing  at  the 
edge  of  the  churchyard  looking  down  the  river-slope, 
would  certainly  have  gone  but  for  the  blackmail,  or 
what  amounted  to  such,  that  was  paid  by  the  towns- 
people. It  was  built  by  Lichfield  not  merely  while 
dissolution  was  in  the  air,  but  in  part  while  it  was 
actually  in  progress,  and  intended  both  for  a  belfry 
and  gateway.  Over  100  feet  high,  with  buttresses 
at  each  angle,  carried  almost  to  the  base  of  the 
open-work  battlements,  and  graceful  crocketed  pin- 


150  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

nacles,  this  tower  is  a  truly  beautiful  piece  of 
work. 

It  is  fashioned  in  three  stories,  each  story  con- 
taining four  stages  of  perpendicular,  trefoil-headed 
arcading.  The  outer  face  even  of  the  buttresses 
displays  ornate  arcading  of  similar  pattern,  while 
the  open  battlements  are  singularly  graceful  and 
elaborate.  A  large  ogee-headed,  four-light  window, 
with  transoms  in  the  middle  story,  faces  the  west, 
with  a  clock  space  in  the  one  above.  The  belfry 
commands  every  approach,  and,  as  a  last  word  upon 
Evesham  Abbey,  one  would  like  always  to  recall 
that  view  of  it  from  the  river  where  the  tower  stands 
out  upon  the  meadowy  ridges,  the  thick  elm  foliage 
and  the  spires  of  the  two  parish  churches  springing 
in  the  immediate  background. 

The  abbey,  as  the  originator  of  the  town,  so  entirely 
controlled  it  that  in  spite  of  the  considerable  popula- 
tion, for  the  period,  of  2000  souls,  it  was  governed, 
till  the  Dissolution,  by  two  bailiffs  under  the  abbot. 
But  between  1642-46  Evesham  was  to  see  more 
of  war  and  war's  alarms  than  at  any  previous 
period,  even  that  of  the  turbulent  Middle  Ages. 
Its  situation  between  Warwick,  a  consistent  Parlia- 
ment stronghold  and  region,  and  Gloucester  the 
important  and  stoutly  held  post  of  that  party  in  their 
enemies'  country,  added  consequence  to  such  as  it 
already  possessed  merely  by  virtue  of  being  within 
the  hottest  area  of  the  war.  But  leading  incidents 
are  more  to  the  point  here  than  any  involved  narrative 
of  its  varying  fortunes,  and  the  leading  incident  in 
the  case  of  Evesham  was  its  capture  by  assault  in 
May  1645.  No  more  gallant  action  indeed  was  fought 
in  the  whole  war  than  this  one  by  Massey  on  the  one 
side,  and  Colonel  Legge  upon  the  other. 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        151 

The    king    had    passed    through    Evesham    on    his 
way  from  Oxford  to  the  north-west  and  carried  away 
with  him  enough  of  its  garrison  to  reduce  it  to  700 
men.     Massey,    that    brilhant    Parhamentary    leader 
still  seated  at  Gloucester,  which  he  had  so  gloriously 
defended  and  made  infinite  use  of  at  all  times,  was 
bent  on  the  capture  of  Evesham,  as  by  this  means 
he  would  cut  the  line  of  the  king's  communications 
with   Oxford.     He   and   his   men   were   also   a   little 
nettled   at   a   rebuff   they   had   recently   received   at 
Ledbury  from  the    hands    of    Rupert.      So    on    May 
23rd  the  Parliamentary  general  left    Gloucester  with 
500    men    and    a    brigade   of   cavalry.     At    Tewkes- 
bury, which  was   for    the    moment    in   their    hands, 
he  picked  up  reinforcements,   and    marching    on   to 
Evesham  received  a  further  contingent  from  Warwick, 
which   brought    his   total    force   up   to    2000    men. 
From   Bengeworth,   the   suburb   on   the   farther    side 
of   the  Avon,  he   sent    a  summons    to  the  Royalist 
governor  to  surrender  or  expect  such  justice  as  fire 
and    sword    would    administer.     Legge,    however,    in 
spite  of  his  inferior  force  and  the  measure  that  would 
be  meted  out  to  his  garrison  and  himself  in  case  of 
failure,   defied    Massey  with    laudable    courage,    and 
declared  himself  "  nothing  terrified  at  the  summons". 
His  defences  were  the  river,  to  the  extent  of  its  wide 
horse-shoe  bend,  while  on  the  unprotected  side,  which 
faced  the  present  railroad  and,  in  short,  the  very  slope 
on  which  de  Montfort  had  fought  his  last  battle,  he 
had  raised  an  earthen  rampart,  surmounted  with  a 
palisade   and   further   protected    by   a   ditch.     Even 
this,  however,  was  a  long  line  to  defend  with  so  small 
a  company.     Massey  decided  to  attack  the  rampart 
at   five  points   and   also   the  bridge  at  Bengeworth. 
Thus  prepared  he   lay  throughout  the  night   of  the 


152  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

twenty-fifth.  He  had  no  guns  and  counted  upon  a 
direct  assault,  his  men  being  provided  with  faggots 
to  throw  into  the  ditch. 

Soon  after  dayhght  the  whole  force,  thus  disposed 
into  separate  companies,  made  a  simultaneous  dash, 
Massey,  as  was  his  wont,  leading  the  principal  division 
against  the  most  vital  point  of  the  works.  The  men 
rushed  the  ditch,  climbed  the  breastwork,  and  tore 
down  the  palisades  with  which  they  were  defended, 
and  gained  the  rampart.  The  intention  was  to  hold 
this  latter  until  reinforcements  could  be  brought 
enabling  them  to  break  a  way  into  the  town.  But 
Legge's  musketeers  poured  in  such  effective  volleys 
that  Massey's  men  could  not  face  them,  and  sought 
shelter  under  the  outer  ditch.  Again  their  leader 
led  them  in  person  up  to  the  deadly  rampart,  and 
this  time  over  it  into  the  edge  of  the  town.  The 
defenders,  however,  attacked  them  with  such  vigour 
as  to  drive  them  back  again  to  the  rampart  and  behind 
the  breastwork,  where  they  maintained  themselves 
against  all  further  attempts  of  the  Royalists,  who 
were  in  truth  too  few  to  take  any  of  the  hazards  of 
pursuit.  In  this  situation  a  musketry  fire  was  now 
kept  up  between  the  two  parties.  Already  Legge 
had  been  compelled  to  weaken  his  scanty  force  to- 
wards the  Worcester  road  on  the  north  side  and 
thus  gave  an  opportunity  to  another  party  of  Massey's 
men  to  break  a  way  through  the  entrenchments.  So 
in  a  few  minutes  a  crowd  of  dragoons  poured  through 
and  rode  down  on  Legge's  flank,  forcing  him  to  retire, 
before  this  double  attack,  into  the  town. 

But  the  gallant  Royalists  were  not  yet  discomfited. 
Turning  once  more  on  the  enemy,  seasoned  soldiers 
though  these  latter  were,  they  drove  them  gradually 
back   to   the  ramparts  and   threatened,  after  all,    to 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        153 

wrest  the  victory  from  the  besiegers,  whose  horse  and 
foot  were  showing  signs  of  abated  zeal  and  many  of 
them  already  running  for  shelter.  But  now  the  town 
was  forced  at  a  third  place  and  the  defence  of  the 
bridge  over  the  Avon  being  broken,  Massey's  other 
division  charged  up  Bridge  Street  and  took  the  devoted 
governor  and  his  small  band  in  the  rear.  A  final 
attack  was  made  on  him  from  all  sides,  and  at  length 
when  his  situation  was  obviousl}''  desperate  Legge 
and  his  surviving  men  laid  down  their  arms.  "  No 
battle  in  the  Civil  War  ",  says  Mr.  Willis-Bund,  whose 
illuminating  studies  of  the  lesser  fights  in  this  cock- 
pit of  the  strife  are  of  abiding  interest  to  those  who, 
like  himself,  know  the  ground,  "  reflected  greater 
credit  alike  on  victors  and  vanquished".  Yet  this 
battle,  the  mere  outline  of  which  I  have  sketched 
here,  is  one  of  innumerable  others  in  this  and  many 
parts  of  England  that  are  scarcely  mentioned  by 
historians.  The  stirring  incidents  of  those  four  years 
are  beyond  the  compass  of  general  histories  of  the  war. 
With  all  that  can  be  done  by  the  stately  diction  and 
invaluable  contemporary  knowledge  of  Clarendpn,  or 
by  the  scholarly  hand  of  a  Gardiner  in  our  own  day, 
there  is  perforce  left  untouched  an  infinite  store  of 
local  chronicle  that  brings  the  reader  face  to  face 
with  the  men  and  the  passions  of  that  wonderful 
period  in  an  intimate  personal  fashion  which  seems 
to  put  him  behind  the  scenes  and  illuminate  the 
pages  which  history  must  treat  with  a  broader  brush 
and  lose  something  in  so  doing.  There  is  happily,  how- 
ever, a  great  deal  of  this  intimate  and  personal  view 
of  the  struggle  accessible  and  familiar  in  well-known 
works  such  as  the  "  Verney  Papers ",  and  Ludlow's 
"Memorials",  and  the  "Life  of  Falkland".  But  it  is  sur- 
prising, if  one  gets  into  the  by-ways  of  county  chronicles 


154  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

and  evidence  unknown  to  or  forgotten  by  the  world, 
what  vivid  pictures  of  the  average  man  and  woman, 
confronted    with    an    unprecedented    situation    and 
looking  at  it  from  a  parochial  point  of  view,  one  gets, 
and  how  helpful  it  is  to  a  better  understanding  or,  at 
any  rate,  a  greater  appreciation  of  the  broader  treat- 
ment of  the  historian.     The  latter  can  do  much,  but 
if  you  go  to  him  primed  with  the  military  and  social 
history  of  even  a  single  county,  within  the  zone  of 
war,  whether  Worcester    or   Wilts,    Northumberland 
or  Devonshire  or  Hereford,  he  can  certainly  do  much 
more  for  you.     For  it  must  be  remembered  that  apart 
from  the  regular  campaigns  of  the  well-known  leaders 
and  the  main  armies  on  either  side,  all  counties  had 
their  two  parties,  however  unequal  in  strength  they 
might  be.     In  many  of  the  Commonwealth  counties 
of  the  east,  in  one  or  two  of  the  Royalist  counties 
of  the  west,  and  in  most  of  Wales,  the  "  under  dog  " 
was  not  articulate  perhaps  in  a  military  sense,  but 
even  here  there  was  a  good  deal  of  faction  and  unsettle- 
ment,  particularly  when  the  pinching  financial  strain 
of  civil   war   cooled   the   ardour  born   of  sentiment. 
But  numbers  of  counties  may  be  said  to  have  had 
their  own  little  wars  in  chronic  progress  merging  in 
the  larger  one  when  its  tide  drifted  their  way.     Raids 
and  forays,  sieges  of  small  towns  and  country  houses, 
without  any  other  design  than  that  of  clearing  the 
county  or  district   of  every  armed  group  belonging 
to  the  hostile  faction,  and  very  often  with  no  better 
motive  than  plunder,  were  always  going  forward.     The 
storming  of  Evesham,  however,  was  not  merely  an 
outstanding  incident  in  the  exceedingly  full  military 
chronicle  of  Worcestershire,  but,  as  we  have  seen,  a 
bold  stroke  of  Massey's  to  cut  the  line  of  the  Royalist 
communications  between  Oxford  and  the  west. 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        155 

To  turn,  however,  from  the  spear  to  the  ploughshare 
it  is  a  pleasant  and  felicitous  legend  that  traces  the 
modern  reputation  of  the  Evesham  gardeners  back 
to  the  monks  of  old.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  a  certain 
Bernadi,  an  Italian  of  noble  family  but  of  an  English 
mother,  who  settled  in  the  town  just  after  the  Civil 
War,  seems  to  have  set  the  example  of  scientific 
gardening  and  given  the  needed  stimulus  to  his  neigh- 
bours in  an  art  they  have  never  lost.  That  Bernadi 
himself  conducted  the  operations  on  the  rich  grounds 
of  the  old  monastery  gives  a  kind  of  continuity  and 
a  further  touch  of  romance  to  Evesham  horticulture. 
But  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  industry  as  an  export 
trade  dates  from  his  day.  Quite  early  in  the  eighteenth 
century  we  read  of  loads  of  fruit  and  vegetables  going 
by  road  to  Birmingham  and  by  water  to  Bristol. 
The  Bernadis,  father  and  son,  seem  both  to  have 
been  men  of  originality  and  enterprise,  if  the  directions 
into  which  their  talents  led  them  were  conspicuously 
opposed.  The  son  ran  away  from  home  at  thirteen, 
and  in  the  absence  of  details  one  can  well  picture  so 
adventurous  a  youth  breaking  from  the  drudgery  of 
the  parental  market  garden.  Eventually  he  enlisted 
as  a  private  soldier  in  the  service  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange,  and  by  talents  and  valour  rapidly  won  a 
captain's  commission.  He  was  afterwards  wounded  at 
the  siege  of  Gibraltar  in  1674,  and  again  in  endeavour- 
ing to  part  two  friends  who  were  fighting  a  duel. 
At  the  siege  of  Maestricht  he  lost  an  eye,  was  shot  in 
the  arm,  and  left  for  dead  on  the  field.  He  recovered, 
however,  married  a  Dutch  lady  of  family,  and  w'hen 
the  English  regiments  in  the  Dutch  service  were 
recalled  to  the  precarious  establishment  of  James  H, 
Bernadi  was  one  of  the  few  officers  who  faced  the  pros- 
pect.    He  fell  out  with  the  Prince  of  Orange,  followed 


156  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

James  to  Ireland,  and,  sharing  the  ruin  of  his  master's 
fortunes,  retired  to  Holland.  Visiting  London  soon 
afterwards,  he  was  arrested  on  suspicion  of  being 
concerned  in  a  plot  to  assassinate  William  HI,  thrown 
into  prison,  and  kept  there  for  more  than  forty  years. 
He  was  never  legally  condemned,  and  four  sovereigns 
and  six  parliaments  refused  to  give  him  the  benefit 
of  the  doubt.  Far  into  the  reign  of  George  H  this 
unfortunate  man  was  still  languishing  in  durance 
vile  on  suspicion  of  designs  against  an  alien  monarch 
whom  most  people  must  have  practically  forgotten 
all  about. 

It  was  a  curious  business ;  and  the  prison  arrange- 
ments of  those  days  were  mysterious,  for  they  did 
not  prevent  the  prisoner  in  this  case  from  marrying  a 
devoted  second  wife,  who  earned  enough  to  give  him 
some  comfort  in  captivity  and  bore  him  ten  children. 
We  are  told  by  persons  who  lived  near  his  time,  and 
do  not  seem  to  have  recognized  anything  very  peculiar 
in  such  an  astonishing  situation,  that  he  bore  his  con- 
finement with  much  resignation,  and  one  can  fancy  so 
domestic  a  life,  without  any  responsibilities,  must  have 
helped  him  to  endure  it.  He  was  a  little  man  of  great 
courage  and  constancy,  we  are  told,  and  in  his  seventy- 
fourth  year  published  his  life  and  his  grievances,  with 
a  portrait  of  himself  in  armour.  I  have  ventured  to 
give  it  at  some  length  here  as  the  career  of  a  native 
of  Evesham  and  as  the  quite  sensational  result  of  too 
severe  an  early  apprenticeship  to  its  ruling  industry. 

In  these  early  days,  however,  expanding  from  the 
excellent  example  set  them  on  the  gardens  once  tilled 
by  the  monks,  horticulture  was  after  all  limited  to 
the  outskirts  of  the  town.  Nowadays  the  whole  vale 
of  Evesham  talks  plums,  strawberries,  or  "  sparrow- 
grass  ".     Even  the  porter  at  the  country  station  is  an 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        157 

expert  in  the  fruit  business,  and  habitually  alludes  to 
the  weather  from  the  plum  or  apple  point  of  view  at 
any  time  of  the  spring  or  summer.  And  as  the  heavy 
time  of  shipping  the  crop  approaches  he  instinctively 
raises  his  cap  and  mops  a  yet  cool  brow  at  the  very 
mention  of  it. 

It  goes  without  saying  that  in  the  vale  of  Evesham, 
intermingled  with  men  of  the  large  farmer  class, 
who  are  either  wholly  fruit  and  market-stuff  growers 
or  only  incidentally  so  in  connexion  with  stock  and 
grain  growing,  there  are  great  numbers  of  the  type 
which  gladdens  the  heart  of  every  economist,  namely, 
the  labouring  man  who  has  secured  or  is  securing  a 
competency  by  this  intensive  culture.  Usually  as 
tenants,  not  often  as  owners,  there  are  a  considerable 
number  of  these  men  who  have  laid  by  a  good  deal 
of  money  or  expanded  from  small  growers  into  much 
larger  ones.  Every  one  conversant  with  country  affairs 
knows  how  difficult  it  is  to  judge  whether  men  of  capital 
are  really  prospering  on  the  soil.  Jenkins,  for  instance, 
holds  a  nice  little  farm  of  300  acres,  drives  a  smart 
trap,  turns  up  betimes  with  the  hounds,  and  lives 
generally  like  a  gentleman  in  a  small,  unpretentious, 
but  comfortable  way.  "Look  at  Jenkins",  says  the  lay- 
man and  sceptic  as  to  the  woes  of  agriculture,  "  and 
don't  tell  me  farming  doesn't  pay".  But  Jenkins's 
banker  and  probably  his  friends  could  disclose  the  fact 
that  Jenkins's  wife  has  £300  a  year  of  her  own,  quite 
enough  to  dislocate  all  outside  estimates  of  Jenkins's 
balance  sheet  and  render  him  useless  as  an  economic 
example.  Jones  again,  who  lives  in  equal  comfort 
and  apparently  with  equal  freedom  from  carking  care, 
has,  at  any  rate,  no  wife  with  money.  But  most 
of  his  neighbours  could  tell  our  unbeliever  that  Jones's 
father  was  a  very  warm  man,  and  it  is  not  likely  that 


158  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

any  serious  hole  could  have  yet  been  made  in  his  son's 
portion  by  making  good  an  annual  deficit,  if  any,  in 
his  farm  books.  This  is  the  sort  of  thing  that,  as 
regards  the  capitahst  class  upon  the  land,  is  so  frequent 
as  to  make  appearances  quite  untrustworthy  for  any 
practical  purpose.  Fruit  is  a  precarious  article  to  rely 
upon.  Providence  has  so  arranged  matters,  and  with 
such  nice  equity,  that  the  most  attractive  business 
under  the  sun,  that  of  agriculture  by  employed  labour, 
shall  be  the  least  profitable.  Any  other  capitalist 
would  scorn  to  work  on  the  scale  of  expectation  that 
the  farmer  has  learned  to  limit  his  aspirations  to,  and 
be  only  thankful  when  he  achieves  that  limit.  Fruit- 
growing has  usually  presented  itself  to  outside  eyes 
as  the  most  delectable  form  of  the  simple  and  envi- 
able calling  of  agriculture.  It  looks  even  easier  and 
simpler  than  farming,  and  it  is  perhaps  hardly  neces- 
sary to  suggest  that  nothing  but  the  profoundest  ignor- 
ance of  the  very  elements  of  agriculture  could  account 
for  the  superstition  that  in  an  old  country,  at  any 
rate,  farming  is  anything  but  an  intricate  and  difficult 
business,  requiring  a  pecuhar  aptitude  rather  than 
plodding  industry.  Fruit,  on  the  contrary,  thinks  the 
educated  amateur,  is  a  lighter  business  and  offers  a  field 
more  worthy  of  his  trained  intellect.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  it  is  really  a  more  groovey,  straightforward  busi- 
ness, and  demands  more  dogged  application.  The  or- 
ganizing, versatile,  hard-headed  shrewd  judge  of  soils 
and  stock  who  knocks  a  good  percentage  out  of  a 
500-acre  farm  is  a  bigger  man  mentally  than  his 
horticulturist  equivalent,  capable  and  assiduous  as 
the  last  must  be  to  ensure  such  success  as  the 
slings  and  arrows  of  climate  and  Nature  permit  of. 
It  is  the  small  man  working  on  a  small  scale  with  his 
family,  turning  the  women  in  when  they  are  wanted, 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        159 

who  is,  I  am  told  and  can  well  believe,  the  fortunate 
one  in  the  vale  of  Evesham.  A  man  of  this  descrip- 
tion died  recently  in  middle  life  worth  £25,000,  who 
had  started  as  a  fruit-grower  with  absolutely  nothing. 
But  dealing  and  speculating  in  fruit  is  so  inextricably 
mixed  up  with  its  production  that  it  is  practically 
impossible  to  arrive  at  any  accurate  conclusions 
regarding  the  latter,  even  if  my  readers  were  likely 
to  be  interested  in  so  doing.  In  one  parish  well-known 
to  me  a  great  many  small  growers  own  their  own 
houses  and  have  bought  others  out  of  their  savings. 
The  new  French  method  of  gardening  is  also  com- 
manding a  great  deal  of  attention.  Not  for  a  moment 
that  one  would  not  hope  and  believe  some  measure 
of  success  attends  the  larger  operators,  many  of  whom 
spare  no  pains  in  their  endeavours  to  produce  the 
best  by  the  best  methods,  and  to  counteract,  so  far 
as  possible,  the  sudden  onslaughts  which  Nature  makes 
on  both  tree  and  bush  fruit. 

The  vale  of  Evesham,  as  may  be  imagined,  has  the 
great  advantage  of  heredity  in  horticulture,  and  that 
is  a  very  great  advantage  indeed.  Melancholy  though 
the  fact  be,  it  does  not  very  much  matter  now  how  much 
or  how  little  wheat  we  grow  in  England.  Population 
has  far  outstripped  the  mere  agricultural  capacities  of 
the  country  ;  but  for  the  products  of  intensive  farming 
of  perishable  or  short-keeping  stuff,  the  finest  market 
in  the  world  is  always  here  waiting  the  grower,  and  our 
limited  area  is  not  in  such  case  a  deterrent  factor,  as 
this  is  not  a  matter  of  acreage.  Speaking  generally, 
the  Anglo-Saxon  is  a  better  farmer  or  grazier  than  fruit- 
grower. His  genius  is  better  suited  to  it  on  either  side 
of  the  Atlantic.  If  the  money  that  has  been  absolutely 
sunk  in  fruit-growing  on  the  farther  side  in  the  last 
quarter  of  a  century  could  be  estimated,  the  total 


i6o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

would  make  Americans  stand  aghast,  and  I  speak  with 
some  knowledge  of  the  matter. 

A  few  years  ago  both  the  American  and  the  English- 
man in  America  thought  it  was  only  necessary  to 
plant  orange,  lemon,  apple,  and  other  fruit  trees  in 
climates  obviously  suitable,  and  to  sit  down  and  watch 
them  grow  into  a  fortune  for  the  prescient  owner. 
How  much  has  been  learnt  since  then  could  be  written 
by  thousands  in  tears  and  blood.  The  airy  tourist, 
the  city  man,  the  journalist,  the  globe-trotter,  tell  in 
glowing  numbers  of  miles  of  blossoming  orchards  or 
of  golden  fruit,  seen  from  train  or  highway.  A  letter 
just  received  from  a  relative  lies  before  me  ;  the  writer 
is  virtually  an  American,  experienced,  middle-aged, 
and  almost  born  into  the  business  of  horticulture.  It 
is  dated  from  absolutely  the  crack  orange-growing 
district  of  California,  to  which  the  writer  has  returned 
after  an  absence  of  some  years.  "It  is  quite  sad", 
says  my  correspondent,  "  to  see  the  change  that  has 
come  over  this  district.  Where  all  was  cheerfulness 
and  sociability  and  open  house  the  constant  frosts  and 
precarious  prices  have  impoverished  every  one  and 
entirely  altered  the  whole  style  of  life  and  outlook". 
This,  be  it  noted,  is  from  admittedly  the  soundest  and 
most  flourishing  orange  district  in  California.  What 
has  happened  over  the  immense  areas  of  inferior 
country  into  which  vast  sums  have  been  sunk,  Heaven 
only  knows.  The  whole  state  of  Florida,  again,  was 
practically  ruined  by  a  single  night's  frost  twenty 
years  ago.  Not  only  the  crop,  but  all  the  lemon  and 
half  the  orange  trees  were  killed  outright.  These 
things  fortunately  do  not  happen  in  the  vale  of 
Evesham,  where  the  damage  by  frost  is  limited  at  least 
to  the  year's  crop  of  one  or  other  of  the  many  products 
into  which  most  Evesham  growers  divide  their  venture. 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        i6i 

Does  fruit-growing  pay  ?  What  a  question  !  Does 
farming  pay  ?  How  still  more  futile  an  interrogation  ! 
If  any  commercial  undertaking  in  the  world  depends 
upon  the  individual  undertaking  it,  here  you  have  it. 
The  oft-expressed  passion  of  the  fledgeling  for  an  "  out- 
door life  "  is  quite  commonly  a  form  of  mental  laziness 
and  a  pronounced  dislike  to  mental  exertion.  It  is 
not  likely  that  the  individual  who  disposes  of  his  future 
life  on  such  a  flimsy  pretext  will  be  clever  enough  to 
make  a  farmer  of  any  kind  even  if  he  have  the  applica- 
tion. Farming  is  not  in  the  least  like  Rugby  football. 
One  of  the  most  successful  farmers  of  the  last  generation, 
in  a  region  well  known  to  fame  and  intimately  known 
to  me,  during  the  last  thirty  years  of  his  active  life, 
never  went  out  of  the  house  till  two  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon,  and,  it  may  be  added,  seldom  went  to  bed 
quite  sober.  He  had  a  master  mind  and  an  eagle  eye. 
A  large  tenant  farmer,  recently  deceased,  in  a  northern 
county  held  a  high  rented  mixed  farm  through  all  the 
terrible  years  of  the  eighties  and  nineties,  when  his 
neighbours  were  smashing  right  and  left.  His  heirs 
and  executors,  who  are  old  friends  of  mine,  had  occasion 
to  go  through  the  farm  accounts,  which  were  beauti- 
fully kept,  for  the  whole  period,  and  found  no  single 
year  of  this  disastrous  cycle  in  which  the  balance  was 
not  on  the  right  side.  This  gentleman  was  an  old 
bachelor  of  studious  habit  and  powerful  intellect,  and 
advanced  mathematics  was  his  principal  hobby,  an 
eye  for  stock  and  a  head  for  tillage  his  saving.  His 
nearest  relative,  who  was  qualified  on  both  accounts  to 
judge,  is  of  the  opinion  that  he  would  have  come  out 
in  the  first  half-dozen  Wranglers  without  any  further 
reading.  Another  type  of  genius  has  the  inborn  gift 
for  the  right  estimation  of  a  beast.  I  do  not  mean 
the  ordinary  normal  qualification  that  every  farmer 
II 


1 62  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

grows  up  with  or  acquires,  but  that  touch  of  inspiration 
which  places  a  man  without  effort,  and  only  the  mere 
brief,  necessary  experience,  at  once  above  his  fellows. 
Two  cases  to  the  point  rise  at  once  to  my  mind.  As  a 
very  young  man,  and  more  years  ago  than  I  care  to 
remember,  I  spent  a  considerable  part  of  two  winters 
in  Aberdeenshire  among  the  founders  and  the  chief 
breeders  of  the  polled  Angus  cattle  that  had  then  just 
asserted  themselves  as  the  most  successful  type,  perhaps, 
of  British  cattle  at  the  fat  shows  and  in  the  beef 
markets.  In  those  days,  at  any  rate,  the  tillage  part  of 
the  big  farms  was  run  wholly  by  stewards,  and  the 
farmers  lived  and  moved  and  had  their  being  in  the 
cattle  byres,  and  at  the  fairs,  and  in  their  own  parlours, 
where  they  talked  black  cattle  morning,  noon,  and  night ; 
dealt,  and  swopped,  and  bought,  and  sold  with  each 
other  in  a  never-ending  contest  of  wit  against  wit, 
and  comported  themselves  towards  one  another  as 
regards  their  beasts  precisely  as  a  community  might 
do  who  lived  by  horse-breeding.  They  drank  whisky  as 
if  it  were  water,  at  any  time  and  all  hours,  and  scarcely 
any  of  them  seemed  one  whit  the  worse  for  it.  For  there 
were  hale  old  men  who  had  been  at  it  all  their  lives,  and 
whatever  the  coating  of  their  stomachs  may  have  been, 
their  intellects  on  the  great  absorbing  subject  were 
unquestionably  bright.  They  would  have  formed 
collectively  a  most  painful  problem  to  the  ardent 
temperance  reformer.  But  then  the  whisky  in  those 
days  must  have  been  extraordinarily  good. 

However,  this  is  parenthesis  within  parenthesis. 
What  I  particularly  remember  by  way  of  illustration  is 
a  young  man  from  the  south  of  England,  of  sufficient 
capital,  the  son  of  a  parson  near  London,  and  but  little 
over  age,  who  had  recently  taken  the  lease  of  a  farm 
suitable  in  all  respects  for  the  rearing  and  fattening  of 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        163 

choice  polled  Angus  cattle.  Here  he  set  himself  up  as 
a  bidder  for  honours  in  a  rather  distinguished  and  an 
extraordinarily  keen-witted  circle,  who  would  have 
plucked  their  nearest  and  dearest  in  this  legitimate 
arena,  and  looked  on  an  unsophisticated  young  southron 
of  gentle  breeding  with  money  as  a  monstrous  anomaly 
in  itself,  and  a  rare  windfall  for  his  neighbours.  I  don't 
know  whence  this  young  man  derived  his  genius, 
though  I  knew  him  quite  well,  but  he  had  it,  as  well,  of 
course,  as  a  very  long  head,  and,  I  trust, for  other  reasons, 
a  strong  one.  He  began  by  marrying  into  the  purple 
of  the  polled  Angus  families,  and  it  might  naturally 
have  been  imagined  that  he  was  lifted  into  fame 
thereby.  But  on  the  contrary,  it  was  commonly  said 
that  the  father-in-law,  who  was  a  king  among  cattle- 
men, had  at  last  met  his  match,  and  even  admitted 
over  his  toddy  that  this  stripling  had  more  than  once 
got  the  better  of  him  in  a  straight  out-deal,  and  was  a 
man  to  be  feared,  if  an  embryo  prize  beast  or  begetter  of 
prize  beasts,  in  the  shape  of  some  bull  or  heifer  calf,  was 
awaiting  discovery  within  ten  miles.  Islington  and 
Birmingham  were  more  important  functions  then  than 
now,  for  reasons  obvious  to  any  one  familiar  with  the 
mere  outline  of  British  rural  economics  for  the  past 
forty  years.  And  this  young  alien,  with  an  Oxford 
accent  gradually  broadening  into  the  Doric,  had  the 
blue  riband  of  both,  the  third  or  fourth  winter  he  spent 
among  that  racy  and  remarkable  community.  For 
years  his  name  appeared  among  the  leading  prize- 
winners, and  as  one  of  high  regard  on  the  pages  of 
agricultural  papers.  And  then  there  was  silence. 
That  a  southron  from  a  suburban  rectory  should  have 
had  the  gift  and  the  head  to  exercise  it  in  such  company 
is  remarkable,  but  physically  possible.  That  any 
southron,  however,  should  have  also  had  an  interior 


1 64  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

able  to  endure  the  convivial  accessories  then  inevitable 
in  that  part  of  the  world,  for  so  long  a  period,  would  seem 
incredible,  and  I  drew  inferences  that  may  of  course  be 
utterly  fallacious.  "  My  father  ",  concludes  a  recent 
biography  of  a  well-known  Border  agriculturist  not 
long  dead,  written  by  his  son,  "  always  led  a  temper- 
ate life,  considering  the  number  of  twelve-tumbler 
men  among  whom  he  habitually  moved  " .  Whether 
to  conclude  this  particular  reminiscence  with  the 
"  Autres  temps,  autres  moeurs "  that  the  reader, 
I  am  quite  sure,  will  expect  of  me,  I  really  do  not 
know  ! 

But  we  are  now  in  a  cider  country  far  out  of  harm's 
way,  and  a  beverage  more  innocent  of  any  suspicion 
of  alcohol  than  the  draught  cider  of  the  Avon  valley 
could  scarcely  be  poured  into  the  cup  of  the  temper- 
ance enthusiast,  though  some  hard  cider,  as  every 
one  knows,  if  taken  in  sufficiently  copious  libations, 
can  make  the  southern  rustic  unsteady  of  gait  and 
merry  in  demeanour.  But  the  other  instance  of  that 
inherent  genius  for  a  beast,  which  more  have  and 
so  many  more  think  they  have  for  a  horse,  was  that 
of  an  old  friend  of  mine  who  went  from  a  public 
school  and  Oxford  and  a  country  house  not  a  hundred 
miles  from  Tewkesbury,  to  win  his  spurs  among  sharp 
American  stock  farmers  and  dealers  in  almost  no 
time,  and  in  a  little  more  to  become  a  prophet  and 
king  among  them.  This  curious  gift,  however, 
together  with  those  protracted  bargainings  which 
must  always  be  a  joy  to  the  man  who  feels  an  approach- 
ing victory  nearly  always  within  him  as  regards  horn 
and  hoof,  at  any  rate,  are  falling  out  of  use.  Half 
England  nowadays  sells  its  cattle  and  sheep  at 
fortnightly  auction  sales,  where  the  truculent  and 
the  timid,  the  knowing  and  the  unknowing,  are  re- 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        165 

duced  to  the  same  dead  level  for  the  greater  good, 
no  doubt,  of  the  greater  number. 

The  fruit-grower  in  the  vale  of  Evesham,  like  fruit- 
growers on  any  scale  in  all  countries,  is  under  one  un- 
doubted disadvantage  of  being  largely  in  the  hands  of  a 
commission  merchant  in  a  distant  city.  The  farmer 
sells  his  own  grain  and  gets  his  cheque,  such  as  it  is. 
He  also  sells  or  sees  sold  his  own  cattle  and  sheep, 
and  at  any  rate  does  not  drive  home  from  market 
with  a  bill  against  him  in  his  pocket  as  the  net  result 
of  the  proceeding.  Everybody  knows  that  the  producer 
of  perishable  fruit  sometimes  undergoes  this  lament- 
able experience,  and  instead  of  a  cheque  his  salesman 
in  Birmingham  or  London  sends  him  notice  that  his 
consignment  failed  to  realize  the  cost  of  transport, 
accompanied  by  a  statement  of  the  deficit.  These 
disheartening  incidents  mostly  occur,  of  course,  when 
Nature  has  been  over- abundant,  and  that  fecundity 
which  the  grain-grower  prays  for  the  plum-grower 
dreads.  This  seems,  on  the  face  of  it,  a  most  unnatural 
condition  of  things.  There  are  prayers  for  rain  and 
prayers  for  fine  weather  as  well  as  forms  of  public 
thanksgiving  for  abundant  yields.  But  to  pray  for 
a  half  crop  would  be  absurd,  nay  indecent,  and  the 
grower  of  perishable  fruit  seems  to  be  placed  at  a 
disadvantage  and  in  an  altogether  equivocal  position. 
But  the  general  and  average  prosperity  of  the  vale 
of  Evesham  is,  I  think,  undoubted,  and  if  it  is  the 
small  man  who  prospers  most,  as  his  labour  lies  in 
his  own  household,  such  measure  cannot  be  grudged 
him,  as  it  gladdens  the  heait  and  the  hearth  of  the 
greater  number,  and  holds  out  encouragement  to 
the  lowly.  But  the  larger  men,  of  course,  lead  the 
way  in  scientific  appliances  and  surely  deserve  success 
in   an   infinitely   beneficial   industry   that   is   happily 


i66  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

at  least  beyond  the  competition  of  the  foreigner. 
Some  interesting  experiments  are  going  forward,  too, 
in  the  shape  of  fighting  night-frosts  in  orchards  by 
an  arrangement  of  oil-lamps,  an  idea  borrowed,  I 
think,  from  America. 

But,  after  all,  no  fruit  in  Britain  has  anything 
approaching  the  importance,  for  the  consumer,  of  the 
apple.  It  abides  with  the  householder  always,  that 
is  to  say,  so  long  as  he  can  get  it  or  can  afford  it. 
The  reader  might  justifiably  be  bored  with  a  dis- 
sertation on  the  culture  of  pears,  plums,  and  damsons, 
of  currants,  French  beans,  or  asparagus,  transient 
luxuries  that  never  fail  us  for  their  brief  and  accept- 
able season  and  are  forgotten.  But  the  apple  is  always 
with  us,  or  we  should  like  to  have  it  always  with 
us.  Yet  the  apple  is  rarely  cheap  in  spite  of  immense 
importations  and  advances  regularly  to  a  price  that, 
if  you  figure  it  up  on  an  apple  tree,  seems  to  transform 
an  orchard,  though  wrongly  of  course,  into  a  sort 
of  gold  mine.  Where  lies  the  tremendous  leakage  ? 
In  the  vale  of  Evesham  most  of  the  orchards  bear 
cider  apples,  to  be  sure,  and  in  their  case  you  have 
by  comparison  an  obviously  indifferent  business. 
Cider  ought,  no  doubt,  to  be  a  more  popular  beverage, 
particularly  as  the  doctors  have  pronounced  it  to  be 
not  only  innocuous  as  a  gout-producer,  but  positively 
antagonistic  to  that  frequent  scourge  of  full-blooded 
Britons.  But  it  is  not,  and  there,  for  the  present, 
is  an  end  of  it.  Draught  cider  is  retailed  by  nearly 
every  country  inn  in  the  vale  of  Avon  from  Stratford 
down,  at  a  penny  a  glass,  but  the  country-folk,  who 
almost  alone  drink  it,  and  that  in  much  less  proportion 
than  of  old  to  beer  and  spirits,  are  not  susceptible  to 
the  academic  opinion  of  physicians  on  such  matters. 
The  bottled   article   is    no    doubt   a    most  delightful 


THE  LOWER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        167 

drink,  but  too  expensive  to  be  really  popular,  being 
nearly  double  the  price  of  Guinness' s  stout.  But 
it  is  the  cooking  apple,  which  will  keep,  that  is 
the  real  crux  of  the  apple  question  in  England. 
No  one  can  say  that  American  and  Canadian  com- 
petition stands  in  the  way  of  the  English  grower,  for 
the  price  of  threepence  and  even  fourpence  a  pound, 
which  we  habitually  pay  through  much  of  the  year, 
or,  speaking  roughly,  a  penny  an  apple,  would  be  extra- 
ordinarily profitable  at  half  that  price  to  the  grower. 
Something,  no  doubt,  is  utterly  wrong.  I  say  nothing 
of  the  eating  apple,  with  its  particular  market,  because 
the  cooking  apple  is  of  course  so  immeasurably  more 
important.  A  raw  apple  is  a  desirable  and  pleasant 
incident,  but  the  cooked  article  plays  an  incalculably 
greater  part  in  English  domestic  economy.  The 
households  who  have  trees  enough  for  their  own  use 
when  weighed  in  the  balance  with  those  who  have 
not  are  almost  a  negligible  quantity.  If  the  orchardist 
got  half  or  a  third  of  what  the  consumer  pays,  and 
had  an  orchard  bearing  an  average  crop  one  year, 
with  another  of  keeping  apples,  his  profits  must  be 
very  great.  Yet,  so  far  as  my  experience  goes  of  the 
apple  counties,  there  are  scarcely  any  people  really 
making  money  in  providing  one  of  the  staple  products 
of  English  life,  high  price  though  the  English  house- 
holder pays  for  it.  The  Nova  Scotian,  to  take  our 
nearest  rivals,  if  a  neglected  or  mismanaged  industry 
can  be  said  to  have  rivals,  is  content  with  one  to  two 
dollars  a  barrel,  or,  in  other  words,  from  a  farthing  to 
something  over  a  halfpenny  a  pound  to  the  producer — 
and  though  Nova  Scotia  may  or  may  not  be  making 
money,  it  is  a  great  staple  industry  there,  the  success 
of  which  she  blazes  on  illustrated  literature  from  her 
centres  of  advertisement.     Her  expenses  are  quite  as 


1 68  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

great,  labour  is  much  higher,  and  the  initial  cost  of 
land  not  much  less,  and,  in  the  circumscribed  area 
required  for  an  orchard,  amounts  to  nothing  in  any 
case.  It  is  quite  certain  that  the  average  English 
apple  orchard  is  a  ridiculous  thing  to  look  at  as 
regards  pruning  and  cultivation.  The  trees  are 
left  to  grow  like  the  timber  of  a  game  covert,  and  the 
ground  is  kept  in  grass,  to  its  utter  detriment,  for  the 
trifling  pasturage  value  to  a  few  odd  cows  or  calves, 
a  matter  of  shillings  as  against  pounds  where  the 
fruit  is  considered.  But  here  in  the  vale  of  Evesham 
other  fruits  are  handled  with  the  utmost  science,  and 
apple  orchards  are  to  some  extent  dealt  with  as  if 
the  fruit  and  not  the  ground  beneath  were  of  prime 
consequence.  In  those  parts  of  Canada,  east  and 
west,  and  in  the  United  States,  where  apples  are 
grown  for  market,  the  ground  is  kept  carefully 
cultivated  and  the  trees  scientifically  pruned.  That, 
no  doubt,  is  one  reason  why  growers  there  can  produce 
them  at  even  eighteenpence  a  bushel. 


CHAPTER   VI 
THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM 

THE  wide  uplifted  road  that  runs  a  six-mile  course 
across  the  vale  from  Evesham,  in  a  south- 
easterly direction  to  Broadway,  is  a  popular  one  owing 
to  the  repute  acquired  of  late  years  by  the  last-named 
village.  It  is  an  interesting  enough  road  in  itself, 
following  along  an  ancient  route  known  as  the  Ridge- 
way  and  in  thorough  keeping  with  its  name.  For  much 
of  the  way  it  provokes  the  sensation  of  travelling  along 
a  high  railroad  embankment,  being  screened  by  neither 
trees  nor  hedges  of  any  moment,  and  opening  the 
country  up  and  down  the  vale  of  Evesham,  to  the  right, 
that  is  to  say,  and  to  the  left,  and  to  delightful  pur- 
pose under  the  summer  sunshine.  The  substitution  of 
orchards  and  fruit-gardens  where  woodland  would 
elsewhere  be  grouped  about  the  rich  pastoral  country  is 
not,  save  perhaps  in  the  blossoming  season,  altogether 
an  advantage.  It  is  curious  and  even  un-English,  but 
it  at  least  opens  the  foreground  and  middle  dis- 
tance to  the  richer  sweeps  beyond  ;  Bredon  looming 
huge  and  blocking  up  the  vale,  the  Malverns  gradually 
opening  their  remoter  peaks  like  Welsh  mountains, 
and  the  Cotswolds  displaying  their  rounded  woody 
ramparts  for  a  score  of  miles. 

There  are  no  villages  upon  this  ridge  road,  but  all  over 
the  rolling  plain  of  the  vale  a  spire  here  or  a  tower  there, 
rising  above  the  foliage  which  gathers  round  them, 

i6q 


170  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

give  finish  to  a  picture  that  is  as  fair  a  one  of  the  kind 
as  England  can  show.  Whether  it  is  the  old  red 
sandstone  or,  as  here,  the  new,  concerns  only  the 
geologist ;  as  a  feature  in  landscape  either  are  invalu- 
able. And  above  all,  as  the  summer  sun  begins  its 
downward  course,  the  radiancy  diffused  over  a  country 
whose  soil  is  red,  sheds  a  passing  glory  over  a  com- 
paratively commonplace  scene ;  and  here  in  the  vale 
of  Evesham,  where  Nature  is  lavish  and  supplies  a 
background  of  dignity  and  beauty,  the  combination  is 
singularly  felicitous.  Many  of  the  thousand  American 
visitors  who  every  summer  traverse  this  and  neigh- 
bouring highways  must  be  reminded,  if  they  know  it, 
of  the  landscape  of  Virginia,  where  the  red  soil  glows 
against  the  green  of  the  woods  and  the  deep  blue  of  the 
hills  with  an  opulence  surpassing  in  mere  colour,  indeed, 
anything  that  the  red  sandstone  of  Worcester  or 
Hereford,  of  Devonshire  or  Breconshire  or  Berwick- 
shire can  show.  Not  here,  indeed,  is  such  a  lurid  after- 
glow possible  as,  for  a  few  brief  minutes  following  the 
dip  of  the  sun  behind  the  Blue  Ridge  Mountains  of 
Virginia,  covers  with  illusive  glory  that  long  ruthless 
treatment  of  a  warm  and  generous  soil.  But  there 
the  advantage  ends.  Turn  the  light  of  day  on 
to  those  briery  wasted  fields,  those  red-gullied 
hillsides,  those  meagre  crops,  that  innocent  strangers 
and  moderns  from  north  of  the  Potomac  are  led  to 
suppose  was  the  result  of  the  Civil  War,  and  then  turn 
it  on  to  the  velvet  pastures,  the  prolific  fallows,  the 
lush  hedgerows  of  the  vale  of  Avon,  or  any  other  bit 
of  Enghsh  landscape — How  incredible  the  contrast  ? 

The  thought  is  not  quite  irrelevant,  and  if  it  comes 
often  to  the  mind  of  the  writer  who  knows  both  so  well, 
an  ample  excuse  is  ready  to  hand  in  the  ancient  little 
church  of  Wickhamford,  but  half  a  mile  east  of  this 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         17 1 

Ridgeway  road.  For  here  are  all  kinds  of  associations 
with  Virginia.  On  the  north  side  of  the  altar,  extend- 
ing some  way  down  the  chancel  wall,  is  a  resplendent 
seventeenth  century  monument  to  the  Sandys  family, 
who  still  own  the  manor,  though  resident  at  the  greater 
property  of  Ombersley  on  the  Severn.  Two  altar 
tombs  are  here  extended  under  a  canopy  supported  by 
slender  black  marble  pillars  enriched  by  armorial 
bearings.  On  one  of  these  Sir  Samuel  Sandys,  the  son 
of  the  famous  Archbishop,  founder  of  the  Worcester- 
shire family,  lies  in  armour  with  bare  head,  his  hands 
raised  in  prayer  and  his  feet  upon  a  griffin.  By  his 
side  in  like  devotional  attitude  is  his  wife  Mercy,  of  the 
ancient  family  of  Culpepper,  whose  monuments  may  be 
seen  a  few  miles  north  of  the  Avon  in  Feckenham 
Church. 

On  the  western  half  of  the  same  long,  sculptured 
tomb,  crowded  with  the  kneeling  figures  of  male  and 
female  Sandys,  and  beneath  the  same  gorgeous  canopy, 
lie  Edwin,  the  other  son,  and  his  lady,  in  similar  guise 
and  attitude.  For  the  son  and  his  father  died  within 
a  few  days  of  one  another  in  the  early  autumn  of  1625, 
The  wife  of  the  latter,  who  had  already  borne  the  eight 
children  who  kneel  so  dutifully  beneath  her,  was  from 
the  remote  isle  of  Anglesea,but  of  its  most  distinguished 
House  of  Bulkeley,  and  she  survived  her  husband  for 
over  half  a  century.  This  lady  may  have  some  passing 
interest,  even  in  effigy,  from  the  mere  fact  of  having 
herself  lived  through  the  entire  Stuart  period,  born  as 
she  was  under  a  Tudor  and  buried  after  the  accession 
of  William  of  Orange.  But  it  is  the  association  of  the 
Sandys  with  Virginia  that  ought  to  interest  the  true 
American  pilgrim  even  more  than  the  slab  beneath 
to  Penelope  Washington,  which  naturally  seizes  the 
fancy    of    the    guide-book    writer.    For    Sir  Edwyn, 


173  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

another  son  of  the  archbishop  and  brother  of  Sir 
Samuel,  whose  resplendent  effigy  lies  before  us,  was 
treasurer  and  head  of  the  Virginia  Company,  and 
himself  drew  up  and  presented  the  colony  with  its  first 
charter  of  free  government.  So  liberal  was  this 
Imperialist  in  his  views  of  colonial  administration 
that  James  I  grumbled  that  he  would  sooner  have  the 
devil  than  Edwyn  Sandys  concerned  with  the  new 
colonies  in  America. 

Sandys,  however,  did  even  more  than  this,  for  he 
provided  the  planters  of  the  young  commonwealth 
with  wives,  sending  out  that  memorable  consignment 
of  ninety  virtuous  maids  to  Jamestown,  who  were 
snapped  up  so  instantaneously  by  the  colonists  at  the 
rate  of  a  hundred  and  twenty  pounds  of  tobacco  per 
head.  The  experiment  proved  so  satisfactory  from 
the  young  women's  point  of  view  that  they  wrote  home 
and  induced  sixty  of  their  young,  handsome,  and 
charming  friends  to  make  a  similar  venture.  How 
many  thousands  of  living  Americans  now  owe  their 
being  to  the  far-sighted  consideration  of  this  enter- 
prising man  we  cannot  guess.  The  interest  of  the 
Sandys  family  being  so  much  concerned  with  this  part 
of  England  it  is  more  than  probable  that  a  considerable 
number  of  these  mothers  of  Virginia  were  collected  in 
it.  Sir  Edwyn's  brother,  George  Sandys  the  poet, 
actually  went  to  Virginia  ;  for  one  of  the  young 
women  kneeling  here  before  her  father  Sir  Samuel, 
married  Sir  Francis  Wyatt  of  Baxley,  who  went  out  as 
governor  in  162 1,  taking  the  Royal  Charter  procured  for 
the  colony  by  his  wife's  uncle  with  him.  This  other 
uncle,  George  Sandys,  as  I  have  said,  went  too.  Dryden 
calls  him  "the  best  versifier  of  a  former  age",  and  Dray- 
ton, who  a  dozen  years  previously  dispatched  the  iirst 
hapless  founders  of  Virginia  with  a  singularly  stirring 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM        173 

ode,  now  apostrophized  his  friend  George  Sandys  with 
possibly  a  touch  of  banter. 

And  worthy  George,  by  industry  and  use. 
Let's  see  what  lines  Virginia  will  produce  : 
Entice  the  muses  thither  to  repair, 
Entreat  them  gently,  train  them  to  that  air, 
For  they  from  hence  may  thither  hap  to  fly. 

George  translated  Ovid's  "Metamorphoses"  on  the 
banks  of  the  James  River ;  but  a  land  where  scalps 
were  still  being  lifted  merrily  was  not  yet  ripe  for 
scholars  or  poets.  This  one  nearly  lost  his  own  hair, 
since  the  Indian  massacre  of  1622  burst  upon  his 
dreams.  He  was  by  no  means,  however,  a  mere  dreamer 
and  man  of  letters.  Mechanical  enterprise  would 
almost  seem  to  have  run  in  the  family.  For  as  a 
nephew  made  Shakespeare's  Avon  navigable,  so  the 
poet  uncle  put  up  the  first  water-mill  in  Virginia, 
and  indeed  in  the  American  colonies.  He  signally 
failed  to  plant  the  Muses  in  Virginia,  unless  indeed 
Edgar  Allan  Foe  may  be  credited,  by  courtesy,  to  the 
old  Dominion  which  would  alone  almost  justify 
Drayton's  invocation  of  three  centuries  earlier.  One 
might  fancy  that  the  horrors  of  1622  in  Virginia  had 
a  sobering  effect  on  George  Sandys,  for  he  came  home 
to  put  the  Fsalms  of  David  into  English  verse,  a  work 
for  which  it  is  said  Charles  I  in  his  hours  of  captivity 
showed  a  great  partiality.  The  Culpeppers,  too,  as 
represented  by  the  lady  on  the  eastward  tomb,  have 
a  conspicuous  association  with  Virginia  seeing  that 
Charles  H  in  a  merry  mood  granted  the  whole  colony 
to  Thomas  Lord  Culpepper  and  another  noble  wight. 
There  was  such  a  very  natural  uproar,  however,  from 
its  40,000  souls,  that  the  transfer  was  reversed  by  the 
easy  young  king,  but  Culpepper  was  afterwards  made 


174  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

governor  of  the  colony,  and  a  well-known  county 
there  still  commemorates  the  fact  and  preserves 
a  name,  now  forgotten  in  England,  in  quite  familiar 
use  beyond  the  Atlantic. 

But,  after  all,  the  local  vade-mecum  is  quite  un- 
conscious of  all  these  close  associations  of  the  Sandys 
of  Wickhamford  with  the  oldest  of  the  American 
colonies,  though  it  fortuitously  directs  the  attention 
of  the  American  visitor  to  the  sequestered  little  church 
for  another  reason.  For  beneath  the  Sandys's  mounts 
lies  a  slab  engraved  with  the  name  of  Penelope  Wash- 
ington, and  the  family  arms,  from  which  the  American 
flag  is  said  to  be  derived.  A  Latin  inscription  tells 
us  that  she  died  in  1697,  and  was  a  daughter  of  that 
distinguished  and  renowned  soldier  Colonel  Henry 
Washington  by  Elizabeth  Parkington  of  Westwood 
(near  Droitwich)  and  much  more  besides.  Colonel 
Washington  was  of  the  Northamptonshire  family 
and  an  extremely  zealous  Royalist  officer,  being 
Governor  of  Evesham  for  a  time  and  much  distin- 
guished in  the  stubborn  defence  of  Worcester  in  1646. 
In  what  precise  relationship  Penelope  would  stand 
to  the  Father  of  his  country  is  a  point  we  need  not 
here  grapple  with.  But  the  family  and  the  arms  are 
quite  enough  to  turn  the  good  American  pilgrim  to 
Wickhamford,  little  suspecting  how  much  closer 
association  with  the  history  of  his  country  lies  in  the 
mortal  dust  that  it  covers.  For  though  every  American 
of  education  knows,  I  trust,  the  story  of  the  shipment 
of  wives  to  Virginia,  only  a  very  few,  even  of  Vir- 
ginians, unless  they  have  altered  vastly,  since  I  knew 
them  pretty  intimately,  have  much  acquaintance 
with  their  colonial  history  beyond  some  highly  idealized 
conceptions  presented  to  them  in  picture  magazines, 
interesting    but    sadly   inaccurate   historical    novels, 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         175 

and  some  strange  legends  of  a  gorgeous  ancestry. 
These  last  are  due,  I  am  quite  sure,  partly  to  a  very 
vivid  imagination  that  encounters  no  criticism,  and 
partly  to  a  very  natural  misconception  of  old  English 
social  life  and  a  prodigious  overrating  of  the  country 
squire's  younger  son  and  the  glories  of  that  very  widely 
distributed  possession — a  coat  of  arms.  The  Sandys's, 
however,  from  the  time  of  the  archbishop,  have 
been  very  much  more  than  average  country  squires. 
But  it  may  interest  Aunt  Maria  to  know  that  their 
pedigree  at  the  very  zenith  of  their  distinction  shows 
both  a  London  haberdasher  and  a  grocer  quite 
obviously  on  family  and  marriage  terms  with  their 
knightl}'-  relatives  and  not  in  the  least  bit  snubbed 
by  either. 

The  old  Sandys  manor  house  adjoins  the  church- 
yard and  is  a  delightful  picture  of  seventeenth  century 
"  black  and  white  "  architecture.  As  an  alternative 
family  mansion  it  has  been  abandoned  for  generations 
no  doubt.  The  rather  dull-looking,  big,  early  eighteenth 
century  house  overshadowing  the  charming  half- 
timbered  village  of  Ombersley  has  for  all  reasonable 
time  been  identified  with  a  name,  ennobled  now  for 
some  generations.  Not  that  one  should  make  use  of  so 
misleading  a  term  in  matters  English,  seeing  that  it  has 
neither  sense  nor  logic  outside  its  proper  continental 
significance.  To  speak  of  ennobling  an  old  family 
of  territorial  influence  and  a  coat  of  arms  is,  of  course, 
absurd  and  would  sound  so  to  a  German,  Italian,  or 
Dutchman.  While,  on  the  other  hand,  to  imagine 
a  noblesse  who  had  suffered  haberdashers,  grocers, 
goldsmiths,  attorne5^s,  and  physicians,  quite  gladly 
among  their  ranks,  and  often  maintained  themselves 
in  wealth  and  dignity  directly  and  indirectly  by  their 
means    is    inconceivable    to    the    continental.     We 


176  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

must  leave  it  at  that,  a  situation  obviously  impossible 
for  a  foreigner  to  understand. 

A  wholesome  confusion  this,  and  beyond  doubt  the 
very  saving  of  England,  though  affording  boundless 
scope  for  the  harmless  vanities  of  pretension,  vulgarity, 
and  make-beheve.     The  normal  Englishman  is  hope- 
lessly ungenealogical,  with  an  abiding  reverence,  how- 
ever, for  wealth  and  position.     To  do  him  justice  he 
usually  cares  little  more  for  his  own  ancestors  when  he 
has  them  than  for  other  people's.     Nor  again,  except 
in   novels,    do    the   country   people,    after    the    first 
actual   rupture  of  relationships,  entailed  by  transfer 
of  property,  care  two  straws   whether   the   squire's 
family  have  been  there  for  ten  generations  or  two ; 
but   they  care  even  yet   for  the   squire  qua  squire. 
This,  too,  is  practical,  not  sentimental.     And  I  beheve 
that  position,  rather  than  breeding,  has  always  filled 
the  social  eye  of  the  ordinary  Englishman  since  the 
Tudor  period.     This  cannot  be  admitted  in  fiction,  as 
one  string  to  play  upon  would  be  lost,  and  it  is  a 
useful  make-beheve  sometimes  even  in  real  hfe.     But 
the    fact    remains    that    the    material   unimaginative 
Enghshman  (not  the  Scotsman  or  Welshman)  so  long 
as  there  are  no  obvious  disquahfications,  takes  off  his 
hat  to  the  man  in  possession,  or,  if  an  equal,  accepts 
him  as  one  without  a  single  thought  as  to  his  grand- 
father.    Surely  no  country  in   Europe  was  ever  so 
happy  and  comfortable  a  one  for  the  families  of  the 
successful  trader ;   and  thus  more  or  less  it  has  ever 
been  since  the  time  of  the  Tudors,  in  spite  of  "  Aunt 
Maria's  ",  male  and   female,   and  their  pathetic  and 
picturesque  illusions. 

There  is  a  little  station  at  Broadway  half  a  mile 
short  of  the  village  on  the  new  line  recently  built  from 
Evesham  to  Cheltenham.     Hard  by  it  is  an  extended 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         177 

string  of  recently  erected  and  conspicuously  seated 
villas,  with  doubtless  more  to  come,  that  proclaim  their 
purpose  to  be  that  of  harbouring  the  summer  visitor 
with  merciless  disregard  of  aesthetic  effects,  and  with 
unabashed  contempt  for  harmony :  for  we  have  now 
crossed  the  line  into  the  stone  country.  The  village 
of  Broadway  spreads  up  the  hill  a  few  hundred  yards 
beyond  in  all  the  mellow  beauty  of  the  grey  Cotswold 
stone  and  flag.  Here  below,  however,  is  a  dazzling 
suburb  representing  the  modern  builder's  conception 
of  the  half-timbered  style  such  as  you  may  see  all  over 
the  south  of  England,  spread  naked  and  unashamed 
along  a  bare  ridge — a  veritable  eyesore  in  the  delect- 
able vale  of  Evesham.  Broadway,  however,  is  happily 
unaffected  by  its  inconsiderate  suburb  ;  though  itself 
so  extremely  self-conscious,  it  may  be  doubted  if  this 
much  would  be  conceded  !  Twenty  years  ago  and  save 
for  this  excrescence,  precisely  of  the  same  size,  house  for 
house  as  now,  Broadway  had  for  the  outer  world  no 
existence.  It  is  entertaining  to  discuss  its  rise  to  fame 
with  the  country-folk  in  the  neighbourhood.  To  some, 
though  the  fact  is  overwhelming,  the  cause  of  it  is  more 
than  half  a  mystery.  How  should  it  be  otherwise  ! 
What  is  a  village  green  and  a  further  stretch  of  broad 
ascending  road  aU  bordered  with  grey  gabled  stone 
houses,  or  cottages  of  varying  fashion  but  forming  a 
singularly  harmonious  and  felicitous  whole,  to  them  ! 
Nothing,  indeed,  but  the  ordinary,  dull,  inevitable 
necessities  of  their  lives.  Probably,  if  truth  be  told, 
they  have  a  lurking  admiration  for  the  neat  villas 
above  the  station  ! 

Broadway  had  some  little  importance  in  the  coaching 

period,  as  it  was  the  first  stop  at  the  western  foot  of  the 

Cotswolds,  upon  whose  lower  slopes  it  lies.     It  was  of 

much  consequence,  too,  in  the  Civil  War  as  a  Royalist 

12 


178  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

station.  The  king  and  his  nephews,  Rupert  and 
Maurice,  were  here  again  and  again,  and  it  was  right  on 
the  hne  between  Oxford  and  the  west.  But  coaches, 
kings,  and  princes  had  all  alike  been  forgotten,  and 
Broadway  had  subsided  into  the  comfortable  lethargy 
of  an  agricultural  village,  between  a  good  tillage  country 
on  the  one  side  and  a  fine  sheep  country  on  the  other, 
when  the  first  ripples  of  the  boom  struck  it.  The  latter 
was  the  more  grateful,  perhaps,  as  the  gloom  of  the 
eighties  and  early  nineties,  which  the  wayfaring  lay- 
man forgets  if  he  ever  realized,  but  the  farmer  and 
landowner  do  not,  must  have  settled  down  somewhat 
sadly  upon  it.  The  chief  authors  of  those  evil  times, 
our  cousins  from  across  the  Atlantic,  have  certainly 
made  up  to  Broadway  for  any  ills  they  inadvertently 
wrought  it  in  the  past.  For  among  the  thousand 
strangers  who  now  annually  make  the  pilgrimage 
and  raise  the  dust  of  its  ample  street  they  are  by  no 
means  the  least  conspicuous.  In  brief,  Broadway  is 
now  somewhat  a  spoiled  child  of  fortune.  Not  all  the 
aborigines  like  this.  Some  of  them  complain  that  they 
have  been  turned  out  of  their  cottages  to  make  way  for 
the  letters  of  lodgings,  while  others,  who  would  like  to 
be  handy  to  the  scene  of  their  daily  labours  in  turnip 
fields,  orchards,  or  sheepfolds,  complain  that  they 
cannot  get  quarters.  Not  thus,  however,  a  veteran  I 
fell  in  with  here  one  day,  for  instead  of  the  workhouse, 
which  might  have  been  his  lot,  he  had  fallen  into 
comparative  clover.  He  was  an  agricultural  labourer 
who  had  lived  long  enough  for  the  considerable  family 
that  he  had  raised  to  forget  all  about  him  in  their 
scattered  distant  careers  and  middle-aged  trials  and 
troubles.  But  instead  of  the  workhouse  he  had  found 
favour,  on  account  of  his  skill  between  the  stilts  of  a 
plough,  so  he  told  me,  in  the  eyes  of  a  Cornish  widow, 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         179 

who  rented  a  small  farm  in  the  neighbourhood.  Now 
Cornwall  is  by  far  and  away  the  most  written-up 
county  in  Britain,  more,  even,  than  Devonshire.  I 
often  wonder  how  any  one  can  have  the  hardihood  to 
deliberately  sit  down  and  write  another  book  upon  it. 
One  is  forced  to  suspect  that  it  is  because  so  many 
literary  Londoners  do  not  know  any  other  of  the 
remoter  counties.  The  coast  of  Pembroke  just  oppo- 
site, for  instance,  is  very  similar  and  nearly  as  fine,  the 
interior  a  thousand  times  more  interesting  for  every 
reason,  and  there  are  no  tourists.  But  I  have  never  seen 
even  a  magazine  article  on  Pembrokeshire,  which  is 
thoroughly  characteristic  of  the  sheep-like  habits  of  the 
British  holiday-maker.  I  have  encountered  the  Cornish- 
man,  however,  as  a  farmer  and  a  colonist  in  more  than 
one  part  of  England,  and  he  or  she  have  invariably  aroused 
my  admiration.  Like  their  kindred  the  Welsh,  who 
have  poured  into  Northamptonshire  and  Warwickshire 
since  the  break  up  of  the  good  old  times,  to  their  great 
advantage,  the  thrifty  Cornish  man  or  woman  prospers 
much  on  the  fat  soil  of  the  Midlands.  I  heard  a  good 
deal  in  ten  minutes  of  this  eminently  capable  lady  from 
her  appreciative  helpmate,  and  the  consideration  in  the 
matter  of  holidays  and  pocket-money  with  which  she 
treated  him,  and  was  glad  to  think  that  a  deserving 
' '  veteran  of  labour ' '  had  floated  into  so  safe  an  anchorage. 
Broadway  belonged  to  the  abbey  of  Pershore  till  the 
Dissolution,  when,  as  so  often  happened,  it  fell  into 
obscure  hands,  only  to  be  parted  with  soon  afterwards 
at  no  doubt  a  handsome  profit.  The  well-known 
Worcestershire  family  of  Shelden  then  owned  it,  who 
intermarried  with  the  Savages  of  Elmley  and  then  sold 
land  to  no  less  than  thirteen  freeholders,  most  of  whom 
seem  to  have  been  armigers.  This  is  only  worth 
mentioning  as  a  mere  passing  instance  for  the  few  who 


i8o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

care  for  such  things  of  the  wide  distribution  of  property 
in  former  days.  As  a  matter  of  course,  this  altered  as 
time  went  on,  and  one  finds  a  few  of  these  many  owners 
remaining  in  possession  of  the  whole,  among  them  the 
Winningtons  and  Lygons  (Beauchamp  family).  The 
former  have  been  for  some  centuries  seated  in  the 
Teme  valley  above  Worcester  and  always  a  power  in 
that  country. 

But  Broadway  itself  has  fallen  upon  altogether 
different  times  and  is  a  good  deal  more  than  what 
Squire  Harbington  of  Hindlip  in  his  seventeenth  cen- 
tury notes  describes  it :  "A  broad  highway  from  the 
shepherd's  cotes  on  the  mountain  wolds  down  to  the 
most  fruitful  vale  of  Evesham."  It  has  been  taken 
possession  of  by  persons  of  leisure  mostly,  from  far 
countries  or  counties,  now  this  many  years.  The  larger 
houses  that  were  farmsteads,  inns,  or  what  not  in  the 
days  of  its  obscurity,  are  now  the  abodes  of  ease  and 
elegance,  while  the  cottages  have  been  prinked  up  for 
the  most  part  for  the  entertainment  of  the  summer 
lodger.  All  round  the  triangular  green  and  up  the  long 
wide  way  leading  to  the  mile  of  steep  drag  on  to  the 
Cotswold  summit  the  yellowy  grey  stone  houses  of  all 
qualities  and  at  all  angles  are  on  their  very  best 
behaviour.  It  is  of  a  truth  a  beautiful  old  village, 
combed  and  groomed,  to  be  sure,  into  a  condition  quite 
impossible  in  real  village  life  and  enacting  altogether 
a  different  r61e  from  that  which  it  played  for  some 
centuries  until  yesterday  when  it  came,  so  to  speak, 
on  show.  I  expect  it  plays  at  being  an  old-time  village 
still  in  the  off-season  when  the  lodgers  have  departed, 
the  motors  have  ceased  from  troubling,  and  the  Lygon 
Arms,  a  fine  old  hostelry  as  regards  the  outer  walls, 
reduced  its  summer  establishment.  There  is  nothing 
archaic  in  the  atmosphere,  however,  of  the  interior  of 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         i8i 

this  now  famous  inn.  The  gorgeous  wights,  fresh  from 
Birmingham,  New  York,  or  London,  immaculately 
clad  and  with  trousers  scarcely  creased,  who  prevail 
around  or  within  the  doors  might  well  abash  the  modest 
wayfarer,  cyclist,  or  pedestrian  with  the  honest  stain  of 
travel  upon  him.  Nor  does  the  true  wanderer  want  to 
be  ministered  to  by  a  Cockney  waiter  in  a  dress  suit  and 
white  tie  any  more  than  he  wants  to  wander  at  twenty- 
five  miles  an  hour.  Nor  again  would  it  profit  him  to 
demand  a  pint  of  draught  cider  at  the  Lygon  Arms, 
though  twenty  years  ago,  LU  warrant,  a  bumper  of  this 
best  of  summer  drinks  would  have  sparkled  for  him 
gladly.  Indeed,  it  is  well  to  remember  that  in  the  apple- 
country  the  dispensing  of  cider  on  draught  is  the  mark  of 
the  homely  unaspiring  house  that  has  not  yet  emerged 
from  its  old  local  character.  Such  a  demand  is  so 
obviously  resented  by  the  more  aristocratic  landlord 
in  the  Avon  valley,  that  I  have  given  myself  much  mild 
entertainment  by  consistently  asking  for  it  when  cast 
perforce  upon  their  quite  uninteresting  hospitality. 
This  oppressive  atmosphere  of  smart  apparel  in  popular 
wayside  hostelries  is  altogether  a  new  feature  of  travel. 
Men  and  women  step  out  of  motors  nowadays,  cast 
their  outer  wrapping  from  them,  and  emerge  all  radiant 
as  if  straight  from  the  verandah  of  a  yacht  club  or  a 
garden  party.  No  wonder  mine  host  so  often  frowns 
at  the  mention  of  cider  on  draught.  In  former  days 
the  few  people  who  beat  about  the  country,  whatever 
their  degree  or  whatever  their  method  of  progress,  were 
elaborately  horsy  at  the  worst,  but  for  the  most  part 
in  harmony  with  their  object  and  surroundings.  But 
there  is  another  and  altogether  more  modest  house  of 
call  at  the  foot  of  the  village,  lurking  picturesquely 
behind  a  pleasantly  shaded  lawn  where  the  way-worn 
traveller  who  has  a  mind  for  quiet  and  a  taste  for  good 


1 82  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^  COUNTRY 

cider  will  find  a  more  peaceful  anchorage.  I  had  a 
fancy  to  spend  a  fortnight  in  Broadway  as  a  pleasant 
perch  from  which  to  explore  the  vale  of  Evesham,  and 
interviewed  two  or  three  householders,  whose  quarters 
were  recommended.  The  period  was  late  June,  and  I 
quickly  discovered  that  something  like  an  apology  was 
due  for  imagining  that  an  application  at  so  late  a  date 
for  entertainment  in  the  ensuing  holiday  season  was 
in  order.  I  forget  for  how  many  months  or  even  years 
previously  I  was  informed  with  considerable  empresse- 
ment  that  each  of  these  much-in-request  sets  of  rooms 
had  been  pre-empted. 

I  do  not  know  exactly  what  the  ordinary  mortal 
does  with  himself  for  any  length  of  time  in  Broadway, 
charming  though  the  village  is.  He  must  inhale,  for 
one  thing,  an  enormous  amount  of  dust,  for  the  motor 
will  be  always  with  him  and  close  to  his  windows. 
This  passing  curiosity  on  my  part  in  no  sense  applies 
to  the  American  of  taste.  I  have  lived  myself  for  so 
many  years  in  that  country  and  among  Americans 
that,  in  spite  of  an  intimacy  more  than  common  with 
the  varied  beauties  of  my  own  country  and  its  associa- 
tions, I  can  still  recall  with  a  little  effort  how  it  used  to 
look  after  a  long  period  of  absence.  It  is  absolutely 
impossible  for  an  Englishman,  without  some  measure  of 
sustained  familiarity  with  a  transatlantic  atmosphere, 
to  realize  how  bewitching  this  little  island  looks  to 
an  American  with  anything  of  a  soul  within  him. 
We  ourselves  are  so  familiarized  with  the  velvet  carpet 
that  clothes  the  land,  with  the  mellow  buildings  that 
cover  it,  with  the  hedgerows  that  lay  their  lush  tracery 
all  over  it,  that  they  mean  almost  nothing  to  us, 
though,!  imagine,  a  protracted  sojourn  ontheContinent, 
despite  all  varieties  of  magnificent  scenery,  must 
bring  home  to  many  what  a  unique  land  is  ours. 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         183 

But  the  American,  after  all,  the  true  American,  I 
mean,  of  that  British  stock  which  made  his  country 
and  possesses  a  mind,  cannot  look  on  England  as  he 
looks  on  France  or  Germany.  The  very  notion  is, 
of  course,  foolish.  Any  Englishman  who  is  capable 
of  thinking  at  all  can  form  some  estimate  of  what  this 
country  means  to  an  American  of  British  descent 
visiting  it  for  the  first  time.  But  it  is  necessary  to 
have  lived  in  America,  whether  in  its  beautiful  or 
in  its  duller  regions  matters  nothing,  to  understand 
what  the  mere  surface  of  England  looks  like  to  a 
visitor  from  there.  And  for  the  same  reason  it  is  by 
no  means  those  scenes  that  most  appeal  to  us  English 
folk  that  give  our  American  kinsmen  the  acutest  form 
of  that  special  pleasure  which  they  derive  from 
English  scenery.  We  are  so  accustomed  to  the 
ordinary  domestic,  gracious,  low-pitched  landscape, 
we  can  scarcely  imagine  anything  else,  and  conse- 
quently regard  it  as  commonplace,  and  most  natur- 
ally go  to  counties  of  a  wilder  and  more  uplifted 
character  for  our  ideals  of  beauty.  It  is  in  what  is 
commonplace,  or  at  least  normal  to  us,  that  the 
American  will  at  first  at  any  rate  find  his  chief 
pleasure  ;  the  restful,  mellow,  ancient  peace,  the  well- 
groomed  velvet  pastures,  the  timbered  parklands, 
the  flowery  hedgerows,  the  villages  with  their  wealth 
of  architectural  and  floral  detail.  We  can  admire  all 
these  things  ourselves,  but  almost  take  for  granted 
that  they  are  the  normal  accessories  of  an  ordinary 
country-side.  As  to  the  eyes  with  which  the  American 
sees  them,  we  can,  I  repeat,  have  no  conception. 
Circumstances  have  enabled  me  at  one  time  to  look 
through  these  glasses  so  nearly  as  one  of  themselves 
that  the  rest  is  simple.  The  picture  thus  presented, 
merely  in  a  physical  sense,  is  outside  verbal  definition. 


1 84  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

and  is  also  a  matter  of  atmosphere.  Save  for  the 
absence  of  hedges  and  old  buildings  it  would  not  be 
easy  to  define  on  paper  precisely  wherein  the  vast 
difference  lies  between  many  a  landscape  in  the 
Eastern  States,  and  an  average  English  rural  scene. 
The  crops  are  virtually  the  same,  and  the  fields  bear 
the  mark  of  the  same  agricultural  traditions  and 
general  habit  of  life,  speaking  broadly ;  the  oak,  the 
elm,  and  the  ash  are  quite  likely  to  be  predominant 
in  either  picture,  the  Lombardy  poplar  with  equal 
probability  to  sway  over  the  Pennsylvania  or  Massa- 
chusetts homesteads  as  over  that  of  Warwickshire. 
Even  the  American  farmhouse  may  well  be  of  stone 
or  brick,  toned  by  many  score  of  years,  and  flanked  by 
orchards  ripe  in  age  and  occasionally  in  as  picturesque 
disarray,  with  all  the  other  amenities  an  old  farming 
community  gathers  round  it.  But  this  is  all  of  no  use. 
The  English  landscape  comes  with  a  shock  of  delight 
and  surprise  on  the  American  with  eyes  to  see  or  sense 
to  feel,  while  on  the  top  of  the  mere  physical  effect 
comes  the  intense  appeal  to  the  storehouse  of  his 
mind,  crammed  as  it  must  needs  be  with  men  and 
deeds  of  the  book-world  that  have  only  lacked  as  yet 
the  stage  to  picture  them  on.  It  is  all  very  well  to 
talk  of  Paris,  or  Rome,  or  Jerusalem.  But  to  the 
properly  constituted  American  the  first  sight  of 
England,  I  venture  to  say  with  some  confidence,  is 
an  infinitely  more  memorable  moment  for  reasons 
too  obvious  to  waste  time  upon.  Americans,  too,  are 
more  sentimental  and  imaginative  as  a  people,  and 
much  closer  observers  of  material  things  than  Britons, 
who  are  capable  at  any  time  of  selecting  the  night  for 
travelhng  through  a  fresh  and  interesting  country 
they  may  never  see  again,  for  some  trifling  reason  of 
meals  or  comfort.     And  as  a  conclusion  to  this  long 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         185 

homily,  the  American  pressed  for  time  assuredly  finds 
along  the  banks  of  the  Avon,  from  Stratford  to  Tewkes- 
bury, the  kind  of  English  landscape  that  embodies 
most  that  he  is  looking  for.  He  has  not  such  strong 
reasons  as  we  have  for  going  to  our  more  picturesque 
counties.  Not,  by  the  way,  that  these  in  any  way 
resemble  the  Adirondacks  or  the  Alleghanies — for  they 
also  are  unique  in  character  in  the  whole  world — but 
they  need  not  be  marked  "  urgent  "  for  the  American, 
delightful  as  he  must  and  does  find  them.  If  time 
admits  of  this  he  should  not  be  misled  by  an  English 
point  of  view  and  go  to  Devonshire.  He  only  finds 
a  compromise  between  two  classes  of  landscape,  and 
is  generally  disappointed.  He  should  make  for  Wales, 
where  he  finds  our  quality  of  mountain  scenery  at  its 
best,  and  the  mediaeval  castle  which  he  justly  values 
bristling  grim  and  thick.  He  is  also  confronted  by 
another  race  and  another  tongue  in  his  own  mother- 
land in  a  fullness  of  survival  for  which  he  is  scarcely 
ever  prepared,  and  is  in  consequence  pleasantly  and 
properly  staggered. 

The  old  parish  church  of  St.  Edburg  in  Broadway, 
some  way  to  the  south  of  the  village,  is  happily  pre- 
served though  not  regularly  used.  A  first  glimpse 
at  the  modern  one  proclaims  its  erection  as  anterior 
to  the  period  when  Broadway  became  conscious  of 
her  aesthetic  attractions.  But  the  old  church  is  an 
interesting  cruciform  building  with  aisles  and  a  central 
embattled  tower.  The  pillars  of  the  nave  are  Norman, 
but  the  rest  of  the  building,  like  so  many  others, 
carries  on  the  story  in  stone  to  a  dominating  climax 
in  the  Perpendicular.  There  are  some  old  brasses 
and  mural  tablets,  the  latter  to  Savages  and  Taylors 
of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries,  both 
ancient  local  families   and  both  at  different  periods 


1 86  THE  AVOxN  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

owners  of  Middle  Hill  on  the  slope  of  the  Cotswolds 
just  above,  and  the  principal  country  seat  adjacent  to 
the  village.  This  fell  afterwards  to  the  Phillips  family, 
who  made  it  renowned  throughout  England  for  their 
valuable  collection  of  books  and  manuscripts,  after- 
wards removed  to  Thirlestaine  House,  Cheltenham. 
The  summit  of  the  Cotswolds  is  just  looo  feet 
above  the  sea  and  about  half  that  elevation  above 
Broadway.  It  would  be  out  of  our  beat  to  pursue 
the  highway  or  any  other  way  up  the  lofty  green 
ridge  in  the  direction  of  Bourton-on-the-Hill  or  Stow- 
on-the-Wold.  We  have  already  stood  on  Bredon, 
where  the  view  of  the  same  panorama  is  if  anything 
finer.  The  slopes  of  the  Cotswolds  upon  this  vale 
of  Evesham  side,  with  their  swelling  folds  and  rich 
woodland,  are  more  engaging  than  their  higher  alti- 
tudes. I  have  already  alluded  to  my  own  disappoint- 
ment on  first  surmounting  their  tops  above  Broadway 
and  finding  myself  confronted  by  another  edition 
only  of  the  low  country,  subject  of  course  to  the 
normal  effects  of  a  much  higher  altitude.  But  the 
Cotswold  country  as  a  whole  has  been  subjected  to 
such  exhaustive  literary  treatment,  and  at  no  better 
hands  than  those  of  my  friend  and  old  schoolfellow, 
Mr.  H.  A.  Evans,  it  would  be  the  height  of  super- 
fluity to  move  a  step  beyond  Broadway  in  these 
pages.  Indeed,  if  I  have  even  here  been  tempted 
to  discursiveness,  such  a  departure  has  possibly 
been  provoked  by  a  sub-consciousness  of  how  much 
has  been  said  of  the  esthetic  properties  of  the  place 
and  the  restoration  of  its  old  houses. 

With  this  slight  sense  of  oppression  still  upon  me, 
as  one  pursuing  a  perhaps  exhausted  subject,  I 
shall  follow  here  in  fancy  a  road  I  have  followed  most 
frequently  in  fact  for  my  own  delectation,  and  one 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         187 

that  skirts  for  a  time  the  base  of  the  hills  and  makes 
a  pleasant  circuit  from  Evesham.  Bending  north- 
west from  Broadway  and  running  into  Gloucester- 
shire one  encounters  the  three  villages  of  Willersley, 
Weston,  and  Aston  Subedge,  while  high  on  a  bench 
of  the  Cotswolds  above  them,  hemmed  in  by  timber, 
is  the  beautiful  and  characteristic  little  town  of 
Chipping  Campden.  Willersley  displays  a  spacious 
village  green,  its  Cotswold  houses  set  around  it  and 
slightly  raised  in  becoming  irregularity.  The  two 
Subedges  are  mere  hamlets,  but  each  of  them  charm- 
ing so  far  as  they  go.  Weston  has  two  gabled  stone 
manor  houses,  one  of  them  flush  with  the  road,  and 
a  decorated  church  with  a  fine  growth  of  old  yew 
trees  around  it.  Aston  (East on)  Subedge  has  several 
gabled  and  mullion-windowed  stone  houses,  over 
which  the  creepers  riot  lavishly,  besides  a  long  black 
and  white  farmhouse  abutting  on  the  highway.  Here 
a  road,  turning  sharply,  shoots  straight  up  between 
high-wooded  banks  to  Campden.  But  better  even 
than  the  group  of  foothill  villages  just  mentioned 
is  Mickleton  yet  a  mile  farther  on, — perhaps  only 
because  there  is  more  of  it.  Among  other  things 
there  stands  upon  its  village  street  an  ample  and  finely 
proportioned  Tudor  house  still  complete  in  its  stone 
mullions  and  partly  in  its  chimney  stacks.  Behind 
lofty  sexagonal  stone  gate-posts  lurks  another  old 
mansion  of  the  Queen  Anne  style  in  flagged  roof 
and  walls  and  dormers,  but  with  stone  mullioned 
windows  and  Early  Georgian  doorway  and  hood. 
Indeed,  dormers  are  strikingly  prevalent  in  every 
class  of  building,  where  they  are  possible,  all 
through  this  country.  There  is  a  most  imposing 
church,  too,  at  Mickleton  with  an  octagonal  spire 
nearly    100    feet    high,  nave,   chancel,   aisles,  and    a 


1 88  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

remarkable    two-storied  battlemented    perpendicular 
porch. 

But  all  this  has  been  amply  written  about  by  others, 
and  so,  I  need  not  say,  has  Campden.  I  admit  with 
shame  that  till  I  fell  upon  it  unawares  one  summer 
afternoon  not  long  ago,  I  had  never  even  heard  of  it 
except  vaguely  as  a  mere  name  in  Civil  War  literature. 
It  goes  without  saying  that  I  was  properly  amazed, 
more  particularly  as  hitherto  I  had  scarcely  any 
acquaintance  with  this  Cotswold  type.  Campden  is 
one  of  the  most  highly  regarded  of  the  many  small 
towns  which  best  express  it,  and  is  to  the  Avon  side 
of  the  range  what  Burford  is  to  the  Oxfordshire  slopes. 
It  is  a  regular  object  of  pilgrimage  now  from  Stratford, 
or  I  should  not  venture  to  stray,  even  for  a  few  words 
upon  it,  so  far  from  the  Avon.  The  magnificent 
Perpendicular  church,  built  and  beautified  on  the 
great  profits  of  the  wool  trade  when  this  region  both 
grew  and  manufactured  the  staple  so  abundantly,  is 
alone  worth  a  visit.  Close  by  are  some  curious  and 
striking  fragments  of  the  great  house  whose  wanton 
burning  in  the  Civil  War  by  a  Royalist  swash-buckler,  on 
his  evacuation  of  it,  lit  up,  it  is  said,  the  march  of  the 
Parliament  army  over  the  top  of  the  Cotswolds.  The 
long  array  of  gabled  almshouses  beneath  the  church, 
the  wide,  slanting  street,  with  Tudor  market  and  town 
hall  planted  a  stone's-throw  apart  in  its  centre,  the 
many  ancient  houses  upon  either  hand,  the  peaceful 
atmosphere  of  a  town,  too  solid  for  material  decay,  but 
whose  main  business  has  long  left  it :  all  this  and  much 
else  besides  contribute  to  the  charm  of  Campden  and 
give  it  the  distinction  that  it  has  earned  among  the 
lovers  of  old  England's  past.  A  great  deal  could  be 
said  about  it,  its  story  in  war  and  peace,  its  ancient 
trade,  its  architectural  beauties,  its  old  families,  and 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         189 

not,  of  course,  forgetting  The  Campden  Mystery.  But 
these  have  been  told  in  many  books,  and  in  this  one  I 
am  concerned  with  the  plain  rather  than  the  upland. 

On  one  of  the  hottest  afternoons  I  remember  in 
England  for  many  years,  I  was  breaking  a  long  cycle 
ride  at  the  principal  inn  of  one  of  these  little  foothill 
Cotswold  towns,  and  waiting  for  a  cooler  and  a  later 
hour  to  resume  my  journey.  The  heat  fairly  simmered 
over  the  silent  street  and  had  made  of  it  for  the  moment 
a  virtual  desert.  So  I  sat  down  in  the  cool  bar  parlour 
with  a  pint  of  cider  and  a  pipe.  There  was  not  a 
sound  in  the  house  but  the  ticking  of  a  grandfather 
clock  and  the  busy  scrape  of  a  commercial  traveller's 
pen  from  behind  the  open  door  of  the  coffee-room. 
The  window  by  me  looked  into  an  old-fashioned  yard 
where  a  couple  of  gigs  blistered  in  the  blazing  sun 
and  the  stamp  or  snort  of  a  horse  came  once  in  a  while 
through  dark  stable  doorways  in  the  white-washed  wall. 
This  sweltering  silence,  however,  only  reflected  the 
general  condition  of  the  atmosphere,  the  exhaustion 
of  every  living  thing  save  for  a  quite  extraordinary 
contrast  it  afforded  to  the  stentorian  vigour  of  a  two- 
part  comedy  that  was  being  performed  in  a  room 
across  the  angle  of  the  yard  from  my  window. 

I  took  it  to  be  the  public  bar,  and  the  two  orators 
who  apparently  contended  for  mastery  in  it,  were 
obviously  in  a  glorious  state  of  oblivion  to  trifles 
of  temperature,  though  perfectly  articulate — just 
"  market-peart  ",  in  fact.  They  were  obviously  not 
working  m.en,  for  such  snatches  of  their  shouted 
converse  as  broke  loose  from  the  involved  duet  of 
which  most  of  it  consisted,  showed  them  to  be  men  of 
substance.  They  did  not  talk  the  somewhat  deprecat- 
ing intonation  of  the  vale,  but  the  rich,  broad,  burring, 
slow,  emphatic   speech  of    north  Wilts  and  the  land 


190  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

just  beyond,  which  fell  on  my  ears  with  an  old  familiar 
sound.  When  a  couple  of  British  yeomen  in  the 
mellow  stage  start  an  argument  there  is  not  usually 
much  give  and  take.  They  talk  together  till  the 
breath  of  the  weakest  fails  and  the  survivor  drives 
in  his  point  with  something  like  a  shout  of  victory. 
The  ancient  speech  of  Wilts  and  upland  Gloucester 
was  going  forward  here  in  the  good  old-fashioned 
rural  style  of  conversation  which  had  reached  the 
heated  but  not  the  quarrelsome  stage. 

"  My  arr'gment's  this  ",  rang  out  the  first  voice, 
but  the  second  strangled  it  in  its  very  birth,  and  the 
two  ran  along  in  a  confused  babel  of  sound  till  the 
one  gave  out  and  the  obviously  stronger  started  afresh 
and  louder.  "  My  arr'gment's  this  ",  shouted  he,  but 
the  other  had  got  his  breath  and  knocked  the  argu- 
ment sky-high  in  another  long  scrimmage  of  sound 
which  again  gradually  wore  itself  out,  the  stouter 
man  once  more  rising  triumphant.  "  My  arr'gment 
this,  my  vanity's  the  oldest,  I  tell  'ec,  on  the  estate", 
and  then  again  they  fell  to  in  a  long  discordant  duet 
which  sank  gradually  to  a  confused  murmur,  both 
talking  with  evident  signs  of  temporary  exhaustion. 
Possibly  a  pull  at  the  bottle  brought  them  up  to  the 
scratch  again,  and  the  topic  obviously  still  ran  upon 
genealogical  and  reminiscent  lines.  For  the  first  voice 
rang  out  over  the  hot,  silent  yard  and  through  the 
wide  -  open  window  to  the  commercial  room  where 
the  pen  of  the  traveller  still  squeaked  steadily. 

"  /  tell  ' ee  I  know'd  thy  grandjeyther  ".  The  second 
voice  would  evidently  have  none  of  it,  and  there  was 
another  long  bout  which  could  not  possibly  have 
furthered  the  settling  of  so  knotty  a  question.  It  was 
like  one  of  those  old-fashioned  glees  such  as,  "Where 
the  Bee  Sucks  "  or,  "  O  Who  will  o'er  the  Downs  so 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM    191 

Free  ",  in  which  a  bar  or  two  of  a  solo  was  sung  and 
then  the  other  parts  rushed  in  together  with  a  clamour 
of  conflicting  words  but  musically  harmonious.  Here, 
however,  there  was  neither  music  nor  harmony. 

"/  tell  'ee  I  know'd  thy  grandfeyther  " ,  once  more 
rang  over  the  yard,  vibrated  through  the  inn  and  set 
the  horses  stamping  and  rattling  their  chains  in  the 
dark,  hot  stable.  After  another  chorus  the  dominant 
voice  emerged  again  with  a  trifle  more  of  advantage, 
and  consequently  more  deliberation,  accompanied  by 
an  audible  bang  or  something. 

"  I  tell  'ee  I  know'd  thy  grandfeyther ;  /  wur  a  bit 

of  a  nipper,  to  he  sure "     But  the  under  dog  was 

not  to  be  denied,  and  evidently  still  sceptical,  he  made 
another  effort  and  broke  up  any  attempt  at  further 
detail,  till  both  voices  gradually  waned,  and  for  the 
first  time  the  other  got  his  innings,  and  in  a  slow,  soft 
drawl  replied,  "  Why,  that  must  a  bin  yer-rr-s  ago  ". 
And  if  you  know  that  lingo  and  can  hear  in  fancy 
the  long,  soft  burr  with  the  tongue  turned  back  on 
the  roof  of  the  mouth,  you  will  understand  that  the 
word  years,  so  ineffective  in  print,  represented  quite 
effectively  in  sound  a  period  that  might  cover 
about  a  century  and  a  half.  The  landlady  now  came 
in  with  her  sewing  and,  of  course,  gratified  my  curi- 
osity, and  I  learned  that  my  entertainers  were  two 
old  farmers  from  away  back  on  the  Cotswolds.  Further- 
more, that  there  had  been  a  midday  audit  dinner  of 

Squire    B 's    tenants,    and    that    these    veterans, 

scorning  the  ascetic  modern  brevity  of  that  once  great 
and  protracted  function,  invariably  sat  tight,  as  in 
the  days  of  old,  till  proper  justice  had  been  done  to 
their  landlord's  cheer,  and  made  brave  show  to  main- 
tain the  traditions  of  the  past  amid  a  degenerate  age. 
I  can  well  remember,  and  have  many  times  encountered 


192  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

and  come  out  unscathed  from  those  formidable  cere- 
monies that  were  rigidly  observed  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Cotswolds  in  the  days  of  my  youth  and  of  high 
prices,  of  deep  potations  and  strong  stomachs.     The 
port  and  punch,  the  brandy  and  water,  the  church- 
warden pipes,   the  song   singing  and  hilarity  which 
accompanied  the  passing  of  the  farmer's  cheque  to 
his  landlord  are,   I  think,  no  more.     Probably  that 
transaction   became   so   painful   and   was   associated 
with  so  much  tribulation  to  both  parties  that  mirth 
would   have  been  unseemly.     So,  for   any   one  who 
remembered    the    past,    and   was    susceptible   to    its 
sentimental    influences,  there    was    indeed    no    little 
pathos  in  the  spectacle  of  these  two  old-timers  whom, 
of  course,  I  sought  out  sitting  at  the  otherwise  deserted 
board,  living  protests,  as   it   were,  against  a  degen- 
erate day.     Men  who,  in  their  time,  must  have  sold 
Cotswold  wool  at  half  a  crown  a  pound,  when  the 
Cotswold  breed,  now  almost  vanished,  covered  these 
hills,  and  held  fifty  shillings  to  be  but  a  moderate 
price   for   their  wheat.     They   were  rising   from   the 
board,   as  I  took  care  to  ascertain  before  I  joined 
them,  or  it  might  have  been  perilous.     Whether  the 
question  of  the  grandfather  was  settled  I  know  not, 
for  my  presence  turned  what  was  left  of  their  supply 
of  eloquence  into  other  channels. 

From  Aston  Subedge,  in  swerving  back  again  towards 
Evesham,  Honeybourne  is  but  a  trifle  off  the  road,  a 
village  lying  in  the  flat  which,  from  all  the  higher 
ground  about  it  presents  a  singularly  gracious  look, 
with  its  lofty  church  spire  springing  above  the  tall 
elms  which  half  conceal  the  dwellings.  You  may  go  if 
you  choose  from  either  of  the  Subedge  villages  to 
Honeybourne,  along  a  stage  of  the  Roman  way  known 
as  Icknield  Street,   which   runs  to  meet   the  Upper 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         193 

Salway  at  Birmingham,  having  crossed  the  fosseway 
at  Bourton  on  the  water.  It  is  httle  more  than  a  lane, 
but  runs  as  straight  as  a  ruled  line  for  some  miles, 
and  has  the  added  attraction  of  proclaiming  its  char- 
acter without  book  or  map. 
An  old  local  saw  runs  : 

There  was  a  church  at  Honeybourne 
When  Evesham  was  but  bush  and  thorn. 

But  the  tables  in  any  case  were  turned,  for  Honey- 
bourne,  like  many  of  its  neighbours,  belonged  to 
Evesham  for  nearly  a  thousand  years.  At  the  Dis- 
solution it  was  divided  between  Westminster,  Eves- 
ham's old  enemy  and  rival,  and  Sir  Philip  Hoby, 
This  knight,  a  native  of  Leominster  and  of  Welsh 
origin,  served  his  country  with  such  ability,  and  also 
trimmed  his  sails  to  the  varying  religious  breezes  so 
skilfully  that  he  had  not  only  much  Church  plunder, 
but  a  special  permit  for  himself  and  all  at  his  table  to 
eat  meat  through  Lent  or  any  other  Church  fast  day, 
Methinks  his  hospitality  must  have  been  put  to  a 
considerable  strain !  His  brother.  Sir  Thomas,  who 
was  ambassador  to  France,  succeeded  him.  But  the 
Hobys  ran  out  long  ago,  and  the  Graves  of  Mickleton, 
who  were  also  landowners  in  the  adjoining  parish,  are 
much  more  interesting  if  only  for  the  old  Yorkshire- 
man,  John  Graves,  their  founder.  For  Nash  gives  us 
an  engraving  of  this  old  gentleman  in  his  one  hundred 
and  third  year,  the  last  of  his  life,  and  looking  ex- 
ceedingly wideawake.  He  died  in  1616,  having  risen 
to  fame  and  wealth  by  trade  in  London.  His  son 
Richard  was  a  leading  haberdasher,  and  married  a 
squire's  daughter.  His  heir  again,  squire  of  Mickleton 
and  Poden  in  Honeybourne,  was  a  prominent  bencher 
of  the  Temple,  and  Clerk  of  the  Peace  for  Middlesex, 
A  fine  man  by  his  portrait,  and  the  father  of  nineteen 
13 


194  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

children,  the  eldest  of  whom,  a  daughter,  married 
a  grocer,  obviously  with  the  blessing  of  the  family, 
while  the  second  married  a  great  judge's  son,  and  the 
eldest  boy  continued  here  as  the  squire.  The  old 
stone  church,  though  of  Early  English  style,  is  chiefly 
remarkable  for  the  before-mentioned  graceful  octag- 
onal spire  "  Church  "  or  "  Steeple  ".  Honeybourne  is 
in  Worcestershire.  It  includes,  however,  a  chapelry, 
rejoicing  in  the  name  of  Cow  Honeybourne,  in 
Gloucestershire,  the  chapel  of  which,  restored  a 
generation  ago,  as  if  in  endeavour  to  live  up  to  its 
name,  was  used  as  a  byre  and  a  pigsty.  So  much,  save 
that  the  details  of  the  village  are  not  unworthy  of 
its  pleasing  situation,  for  ancient  Honeybourne.  To 
most  people,  however,  Honeybourne  has  altogether 
another  and  more  modern  significance  as  a  railroad 
junction  in  a  region  of  country  whose  railroad  system 
seems  to  consist  chiefly  of  junctions  and  termini. 
To  glance  carelessly  at  a  map  of  the  Avon  valley 
country  from  Tewkesbury  up  to  Warwick  the  intending 
visitor  would  see  a  string  of  fairly  important  towns, 
Tewkesbury,  Evesham,  Stratford,  Warwick,  extended 
in  a  straight  line  along  a  valley,  and  roughly  a 
dozen  miles  apart,  and  connected  of  course  by  rail. 
He  will  doubtless  picture  himself  as  running  up  and 
down  at  will  between  these  classic  places,  allowing  say 
half  an  hour  to  each  stage,  with  no  doubt  an  occasional 
express  of  greater  velocity.  I  use  the  road  so  much 
myself  that  I  had  been  some  time  in  the  country  before 
realizing  that  to  travel  by  train  from  Tewkesbury  to 
Warwick  or  Rugby  meant  anything  much  more  than 
getting  in  at  the  one  station  and  out  at  the  other  in 
an  hour  or  two.  My  eyes  were  opened  by  the 
adventures  of  a  young  relative  who  came  to  see  me 
at  Evesham.     Having  breakfasted  near  the  source  of 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM         195 

the  Avon,  as  it  so  happened,  and  caught  a  quite  early- 
train  at  Northampton,  she  arrived  at  Evesham  at  six, 
having  missed  no  connexions  and  made  no  mistakes, 
though  somewhat  exhausted  by  various  long  waits. 
I  learned  then  for  the  first  time  that  there  was  a  rail- 
road company,  working  under  the  title  of  "  East  and 
West  "  with  which  in  the  weeks  to  come  I  made 
acquaintance  for  the  whole  or  part  of  the  way  between 
Evesham  and  Stratford.  V\^here  it  begins  and  ends  I 
know  not.  Its  business  seemed  to  be  to  gather  you 
up  at  one  country  junction,  and  in  a  good-natured 
leisurely  way,  accompanied  with  a  quite  extraordinary 
amount  of  politeness  even  for  English  railway  officials, 
to  dump  you  out  at  another,  or  occasionally  run  you 
in  to  one  or  other  of  the  little  Avon  towns  at  the 
opposite  end  from  that  at  which  you  had  last  been 
deposited.  But  I  should  like  to  say  once  and  for  all 
that  though  travelling  by  train  quite  a  little,  first 
and  last,  between  Tewkesbury  and  W^arwick,  I  soon 
abandoned  all  attempts  to  probe  the  mysteries  of 
transportation,  or  to  grapple  with  the  various  com- 
panies who  frequently  started  their  train  just  before 
that  of  their  rival  was  due.  I  simply  took  my  ticket 
and  got  in  and  out  at  country  junctions,  or  went 
across  to  linger  at  a  rival  station  under  the  always 
paternal  guidance  of  the  ever  amiable  officials. 

The  memories  of  Honeybourne  village  beneath  the 
shade  of  whose  tapering  spire  and  peaceful  elms  I 
often  went  and  came,  are  much  more  endearing  than 
those  of  Honeybourne  Junction.  Indeed  the  two 
familiar  places  seem  far  apart  in  the  mind's  eye,  and 
to  be  wholly  disconnected  with  one  another.  Surely, 
the  severance  between  the  conventional  country 
station,  closely  allied  to  every  other  one  for  a  hundred 
miles,    and   the   old-fashioned   village   in   the   hollow 


196  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

below,  whose  name  it  bears  on  a  staring  board,  is  a 
thought  that  must  vaguely  float  in  the  minds  of  most 
of  us  in  some  shape  or  other  ?  If  we  know  a  village 
pretty  well,  and  then  happen  on  some  railroad  journey 
to  pull  up  for  a  couple  of  minutes  at  its  station  for  the 
first  time,  how  different  the  impression,  how  aloof  it 
seems,  while  the  reverse  is,  of  course,  equally  appli- 
cable, I  once  took  a  walk  between  trains  from 
Bletchley  Junction,  and  it  seemed  almost  incredible 
that  a  little  rural  world  should  be  wagging  there  as 
elsewhere  without  a  thought  of  Bradshaw.  If  these 
fancies  are  fantastic  and  not  interchangeable,  and  so 
apparently  banal,  I  hope  the  reader  will  forgive  me. 
But  I  cannot  think  so. 

The  villages  of  Bretforton  and  Badsey  have  each  a 
fine  flavour  of  past  times  with  which  to  greet  the 
passing  traveller.  The  small  church  at  Bretforton, 
felicitously  planted  on  a  wide-open  sloping  graveyard 
by  the  road,  is  worth  the  trouble  of  an  expedition 
after  the  key.  Cruciform  in  shape,  it  consists  of 
nave,  aisles,  transepts,  north  and  south  porches,  and 
an  embattled  fifteenth  century  tower,  and  displays 
all  styles  from  Norman  to  Perpendicular.  Within,  the 
rood-loft  stairs  and  doorway  are  still  extant.  Round 
one  of  the  pillars  in  the  north  aisle  is  carved  the 
legend  of  St.  Margaret,  "  the  maid  Margery  ",  A  nun 
being  tempted  of  the  devil,  resists,  and  is  swallowed 
by  him  ;  but,  by  means  of  a  cross  which  she  bears, 
Satan  is  burst  asunder  and  the  saint  comes  out  safe 
and  sound.  There  are  also  some  carved  oak  stalls 
brought  from  Stratford,  and  some  fragments  of 
ancient  stained  glass  in  the  windows.  Just  beyond 
the  church  is  a  beautiful  early  seventeenth  century 
stone  manor  house  close  to  the  road,  and  well  pre- 
served.    It  occupies  the  site  of  a  former  grange  of  the 


THE  UPPER  VALE  OF  EVESHAM    197 

abbots  of  Evesham.  The  present  house  was  built  by 
the  Cannings,  an  ancient  extinct  family  whose  mural 
tablets  I  seem  to  recall  in  the  church  of  Ogbourn, 
St.  George,  near  Marlborough.  Still  forging  onward 
through  the  flat  fertile  plain  towards  Evesham  crops 
and  pasture  land,  giving  way  sensibly  to  the  dominant 
orchard,  and  the  ever-expanding  fruit  garden,  the 
much  larger  village  of  Badsey  yields  a  quite  rich 
collection  of  old  stone  houses  with  mullioned  win- 
dows, and  one  remarkable  half-timbered,  curiously 
fashioned  structure  upon  the  road,  used  as  a  barn, 
which  shows  conspicuously  from  many  distant  points. 

Badsey  Church  has  an  embattled  tower,  a  nave, 
chancel,  north  transept,  and  south  aisle,  mostly  of 
the  Early  English  and  Perpendicular  period.  The 
interior  has  been  so  much  restored  that  little  of  the 
original  seems  left.  But  on  the  north  side  of  the 
nave  there  is  a  most  beautiful  Norman  door,  and  a 
Norman  window.  Above  all  there  is  a  mutilated 
monument  to  the  Hoby  family,  who  included  Badsey 
and  Bretforton  as  well  as  Honeybourne  in  their  grant. 

The  remaining  two  miles  to  Evesham  is  a  good 
illustration  of  how  much  more  prosaic  an  intensively 
cultivated  fruit  country  is  in  the  fact  than  in  the 
fancy.  It  is  economically  interesting,  no  doubt,  to 
see  the  brand-new  red  brick  houses  erected  by  the 
successful  exponents  of  this  deserving  and  admirable 
industry,  but  there  is  no  part  of  the  vale  of  Avon, 
unless  it  be  saved  by  the  fine  outlook  towards  the 
many  distant  hills  that  it  affords  betimes,  which  is 
less  picturesque  in  detail,  or  more  tiresome  to  travel 
at  the  end  of  a  long  day. 


CHAPTER  VII 
EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD 

THE  main  road  from  Evesham  to  Stratford,  a 
matter  of  some  twelve  miles,  pursues  a  pleasant 
undulating  course  along  the  low  northern  slope  of  the 
Avon  valley,  and  nowhere  much  out  of  touch  with 
that  meandering  stream.  You  can  row  a  boat,  if  you 
choose,  the  whole  distance,  but  not  without  difficulties 
at  more  than  one  spot,  over  and  above  the  ordinary 
delays  at  the  various  locks.  Most  of  the  interesting 
and  picturesque  villages,  however,  which  line  the 
valley  upon  both  sides,  are  set  back  upon  its  border- 
ing slopes,  or  still  farther.  Some  squat  upon  the 
highway,  others  amid  the  network  of  flowery  lanes 
with  which  this  country  is  so  abundantly  inter- 
laced. 

The  Avon,  too,  like  all  sedate  rivers  of  only  moderate 
size,  has  its  best  moments  where  it  forms  the  fore- 
ground to  some  ancient  mill,  some  many  arched  and 
mellow  bridge,  some  hoary  church  tower,  or  laves, 
perchance,  the  foot  of  a  gracious  rectory  garden, 
or  wanders  as  in  its  higher  reaches  through  the  deer 
park  of  an  old  country  seat.  Here  and  there,  to  be 
sure,  as  at  Cleeve  Prior  and  Fladbury,  Nature  alone 
in  the  guise  of  hanging  woodland,  lends  it  some  addi- 
tional lustre,  but  all  these  things  can  be  enjoyed 
readily  from  the  shore,  and  the  wanderer  would  gain 

little    and    lose    much,    I   think,    by    selecting    the 

198 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  199 

surface  of  the  river  between  Evesham  and  Stratford 
as  his  method  of  progress. 

The  villages  lie  upon  the  roads,  and  taking  the 
north  side  of  the  Avon  it  would  be  worth  any  one's 
while,  with  an  afternoon  to  spare,  to  strike  away  from 
the  river  road  after  leaving  Evesham  and  make  an 
expedition  into  the  ridgy  hills,  where,  aloof  and  apart 
from  the  world,  lie  a  scattered  group  of  hamlets 
generically  known  as  the  Lenches.  The  little  Norman 
church  at  Rouse  Lench,  with  its  Rouse  monuments 
may  serve  as  quite  sufficient  attraction  in  itself  to  avert 
from  my  head  the  censure  of  any  reader  who  might 
be  disposed  to  think  that  I  had  led  him  astray 
and  beguiled  him  into  a  country  that  has  in  truth 
no  surpassing  attractions.  The  Lench  uplands  are 
neither  romantic  nor  especially  picturesque,  though 
in  parts  well  wooded.  But  they  catch  the  fancy 
rather  by  their  solitude,  amounting  almost  to  melan- 
choly, and  their  remarkable  contrast  to  the  vale 
of  Evesham,  on  which  they  seem  to  turn  their  back 
and  to  have  no  truck  with — a  cold,  clay  country 
of  hill  and  dale,  sparsely  occupied  and  cultivated 
with  the  plough  by  no  means  on  the  intensive 
system. 

Five  hamlets  and  villages  of  microscopic  dimensions, 
all  bearing  the  name  of  Lench,  with  a  couple  of  inter- 
esting churches  between  them,  contain  most  of  the 
natives  who  plough  and  pasture  the  hill-sides  of  this 
detached  region  and  have  no  doubt  been  fixtures 
here  for  all  time.  One  might  almost  fancy  it  had 
been  a  tribal  country,  and  that  the  people  were  all 
descendants  or  dependents  of  some  ancient  chieftain 
bearing  the  name  of  Lench,  and  descended  betimes 
in  predatory  fashion  upon  the  plum  orchards  and 
cider  vats  below.    This,  I  admit,  was  merely  a  fantastic 


200  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

notion  of  my  own  as  I  wound  my  solitary  upland  way 
between  hedges  beautiful  in  their  neglect  and  over 
roads  upon  which  no  one  seemed  to  travel,  and  thence 
passed  on  from  Lenchwick  to  Sherriff's  Lench,  and 
Church  Lench,  and  Hob  Lench,  by  Atch  Lench  to 
Rouse  Lench,  and  was  there  properly  amazed,  being 
quite  unprepared  for  the  spectacle  of  a  beautiful 
little  Norman  church.  But  the  entrance  to  the  Lench 
country  took  my  fancy  not  a  little  for  its  very  contrast 
to  the  trim  luxuriance  of  the  vale  of  Evesham.  For 
the  way  lay  up  a  steep  untravelled  lonely  road  where 
the  hedges  on  either  side  with  ample  margin  for 
expansion  had  been  given  a  free  hand  for,  I  should 
think,  half  a  century — harbourages  such  as  make 
one  feel  with  thankfulness  that  wild  life  even  in  the 
Mildands  is  in  no  present  danger  ;  bosky  mazes  of  gorse 
and  thorn,  of  beech  and  maple,  of  sloe  and  brier  rose, 
of  elder,  oak  and  ash,  all  strangled  with  honeysuckle  and 
convolvuli,  with  briony  and  traveller's  joy.  There 
was  a  wide  weedy  margin,  too,  along  this  road,  stiff 
with  common  wild  flowers  and  radiant  with  their 
bloom,  the  purple  willow  herb,  as  almost  always  in 
this  country,  predominant  among  them.  What  snug 
havens  of  refuge  for  vermin,  or  for  every  wild  thing 
on  wings  or  legs,  the  hawk-hunted  bird,  the  scattered 
partridge,  are  these  long  abandoned  fences  on  a  little 
travelled  road !  A  rugged,  red-stemmed  old  Scotch 
fir  stood  erect  and  alone  here  and  there  against  the 
sky,  like  a  straggler  from  some  distant  wild  who  had 
found  a  spot  more  suited  to  his  mood  than  he  might 
reasonably  have  expected  in  the  cheerful  country  below 
and  stuck  to  it.  No  motors  affright  the  linnets  and 
finches,  the  yellowhammers,  blackbirds,  and  thrushes 
from  these  snug,  tangled  hedges ;  nor  do  the  hill-men 
themselves,  seem  much  of  travellers  nor  greatly  given 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  201 

to  leaving  the  high-lying  clay  fallows  of  their  native 
and  respective  Lenches. 

Church  Lench,  which  lies  in  the  heart  of  the  district, 
has  a  very  fair  Early  English  church,  a  good  deal 
restored,  but  pleasantly  up-raised  amid  a  well-kept 
graveyard  entered  by  a  good  lych-gate.  But  Rouse 
Lench,  just  beyond  on  the  north  edge  of  the  district  and 
some  seven  miles  from  Evesham,  as  already  remarked, 
is  the  gem  of  the  tribe.  You  descend  upon  it  from  the 
comparative  highlands  by  a  deep-sunk  lane  which 
skirts  the  grounds  of  the  ancient  hall  of  the  Rouses. 
Originally  a  Tudor  house,  it  has  been  added  to  in  the 
same  style  within  the  last  half-century,  and  a  fine 
half-timbered  gatehouse  overlooking  the  deep  narrow 
lane  comes  as  a  surprise.  The  church  stands  just 
below  at  the  foot  of  the  long  sweep  of  park  on  the 
summit  of  which  perches  the  court,  beneath  whose 
roof  Robert  Baxter,  a  native  of  Worcestershire,  is 
said  to  have  written  one  at  least  of  his  books,  and 
Cromwell  to  have  spent  the  night  prior  to  the  battle  of 
Worcester :  for  the  Rouses  were  staunch  Parliamen- 
tarians. The  name  is  a  corruption  of  Rufus,  John 
of  that  name  being  the  first  owner  of  the  property 
by  a  direct  grant  from  Henry  HI.  In  1721  Rouses 
were  still  here,  Sir  Thomas  of  that  name  in  the  direct 
succession  then  dying,  after  which  it  passed  through 
two  collateral  branches,  the  second  one — the  Boughton 
Rouses — disposing  of  it  only  about  thirty  years  ago. 
It  is  not  often  a  landowner  as  late  as  Henry  III 
fastens  his  name  on  a  parish  already  rejoicing  in  a 
fixed  one  which  in  this  case,  according  to  Domesday 
entries,  was  Randulph  Lench  (or  Lenz). 

The  church  is  an  exceedingly  perfect  specimen  of 
early  twelfth  century  Norman  work,  containing  naves, 
chancel,  north  aisle,  and  the  Rouse  chapel,  a  modern 


f^VxK 


.^^ 


0 


K;'^^^ 


202  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

addition.  The  chancel  arch  and  those  of  the  three 
bays  of  the  north  aisle  are  semicircular,  while  two 
richly  moulded  Norman  doorways  survive  on  both 
the  south  and  north  of  the  nave.  The  seventeenth 
century  Rouse  monuments,  however,  are  perhaps  the 
most  interesting  features  of  the  church,  being  not 
merely  good  work,  but  some  of  them  quaint  and 
unusual.  On  one  altar  tomb  repose  the  effigies  of 
Edward  Rouse  (1611)  and  his  wife,  the  former  in 
black  doublet  and  trunk  hose  ;  while  their  four  kneeling 
children,  adults,  depicted  on  the  panels,  are  clad  in 
deep  mourning,  which  in  the  case  of  the  three  daughters 
takes  the  unusual  form  in  sculpture  of  black  bonnets  and 
black  dresses.  The  son  here  represented  as  a  mourner 
has  in  addition  a  monument  to  himself.  He  was  that 
Parliamentarian  Rouse  who  figures  conspicuously  in 
the  Civil  War  records  of  Worcestershire,  though  as  a 
politician  rather  than  a  warrior.  He  was  caught  by 
the  Royalists,  however,  here  in  his  own  garden,  and 
sent  to  Warwick  where  he  died.  There  is  also  a  gorgeous 
and  fantastic  marble  monument  to  a  lady  of  the  family, 
fashioned  with  that  wealth  of  imagination  which  in 
the  reign  of  Queen  Anne  and  later  speeded  the  parting 
souls  of  the  well-endowed  to  realistically  aerial  spheres. 
The  lady  is  seated  in  the  front  of  an  urn  (not  at  tea), 
while  behind  is  a  medallion  of  her  husband  con- 
templating her  from  among  a  company  of  cherubs. 

The  churchyard  at  Rouse  Lench  is  so  immaculately 
kept  and  so  adorned  by  recent  planting,  the  church 
itself  so  scrupulously  tended  inside  and  out,  that 
its  very  antiquity  is  at  first  sight  rather  obscured. 
The  little  village  at  its  gates,  lying  in  the  shadow  of 
big  elms,  is  also  swept  and  garnished  and  obviously  the 
object  of  much  benignant  solicitude,  differing  vastly 
in  this  respect  from  its  fellow  Lenches  in  the  hills 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  203 

behind,  which,  though  in  no  wise  unkempt,  suggest  at 
any  rate  no  such  fostering  care.     With  the  confidence 
of  a  fairly  wide  experience  I  had  counted  on  Rouse 
Lench  for  some  midday  refreshment,  and  at  an  already 
belated  hour  discovered  not  merely  that  no  facilities 
of  the  humblest  kind  existed  in  the  place,  but  that  the 
parish,   or  at  least    those    responsible   for  it,   prided 
themselves  in  an  absence  of  anything   of  the   sort. 
This  was  cruel,  but  in  a  little  book  dealing  with  the 
district  thirty  years  ago,  that  fell  unawares  into  my 
hands,  I  read  that  even  then  there  was  no  house  of 
entertainment  in  any  of  the  Lenches,  a  fact  to  which 
its   author,    rubbing   in   a   moral,    attributed   all   the 
virtues  apparently  possessed  by  the  inhabitants.     Let 
us  hope  they  still  maintain  that  standard.     So,  push- 
ing on  with  feelings  not  wholly  amiable  towards  Rouse 
Lench,  I  struck  the  Alcester  and  Worcester  road  at  a 
bleak  and  desolate-looking  stage  where,  like  a  beacon- 
light,  a  lonely  tavern  broke  the  solitude,  the  proprietor 
of  which  was  evidently  almost  as  pleased  to  see  me  as 
I  was  to  discover  him  and  his  primitive  resources. 
And  as  I  tested  these  with  uncritical  heartiness,  mine 
host  entertained  me  unawares  by  an  animated  dis- 
cussion with  the  driver  of  a  baker's  cart,  whose  horse 
grazed  in  the  meantime  in  an  absent-minded  manner 
some  hundred  or  two  yards  up  the  fence  side,  on  the 
respective  batting  merits  of  the  Foster  brothers.     It 
is  to  be  doubted  if  all  the  Rouses,  whose  silent,  life-like 
effigies  I  had  just  been  contemplating,  ever  acquired 
such  fame  in  Worcestershire  as  this  family  of  batsmen. 
To   return,    however,    to   the   river   road   between 
Evesham  and  Stratford,   Norton  is  the  first  village 
encountered,  and  it  enlists  your  sympathy  at  once  by 
the  long  row  of  old  black-and-white  cottages,  some  of 
them  with  carved  gables  that  abut  on  the  road  and 


204  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

are  the  main  part  as  well  as  the  chief  feature  of  the 
village.  Abbots  Norton  is  the  full  title,  derived  of 
course  from  its  intimate  ancient  association  with 
Evesham  Abbe}^  The  church  has  been  badly  restored, 
and  is  in  itself  undistinguished,  but  contains  neverthe- 
less some  very  fine  old  monuments  to  the  Bigg  family 
who,  when  the  distribution  of  church  lands  was  going 
forward,  were  renowned  for  their  sound  Protestantism 
and  attachment  to  Henry  VHI.  Thomas  Bigg,  who 
lies  in  full  armour  upon  an  altar  tomb  of  the  year  1581, 
married  Maulden,  the  sister  of  that  other  staunch 
Protestant  who  profited  much  in  this  neighbourhood. 
Sir  Thomas  Hoby.  And  she  lies  beside  her  husband 
who  travelled  abroad,  we  are  here  told,  and  won  the 
notice  of  emperors.  AnotherThomas  Bigg,  but  a  knight, 
kneels  facing  his  lady,  a  Throckmorton,  over  a  praying 
desk  upon  a  second  altar  tomb  close  by,  with  em- 
blazoned panels  and  crowded  with  the  children  of 
this  obviously  fruitful  union.  Above  the  pair  is  a 
canopy  rich  with  the  heraldic  honours  of  the  Biggs 
and  their  allies.  Upon  a  third  tomb  of  marble  and 
alabaster  lies  a  third  Bigg,  proclaiming  the  progressing 
honours  of  the  family,  as  a  knight  baronet.  He  lies 
alone,  though  compensated  for  his  solitude  by  a  greater 
splendour  of  panelling  and  canopy  even  than  the 
others.  For  his  wife  put  it  up  to  him  and  then 
married  again.  But  this  last  Bigg  sold  the  manor  of 
Abbots  Norton  to  the  Wiltshire  Seymours,  Dukes  of 
Somerset,  and  it  went  with  the  duke's  daughter  to  a 
London  merchant  whom  she  married.  Norton  is 
now  the  property  of  the  French  Royal  family  under 
the  Legitimist  faith,  who,  in  the  person  of  the  Due 
d'Orleans,  is  an  admirable  English  landlord.  But  the 
rigid  observance  of  the  forms  of  royalty  which  is,  I 
believe,  regarded  as  essential,  prevents  the  part  from 


,■.;  41! 


,/' 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  205 

being  played  in  social  matters  upon  the  lines  of  an 
English  nobleman.  In  Norton  Church,  too,  there  is  a 
marble  lectern  which  was  unearthed  among  the  remains 
of  Evesham  Abbey. 

A  mile  or  so  on,  with  the  Avon  running  now  and 
then  at  an  unwonted  pace  away  on  the  right  but 
not  appreciably  our  companion,  the  little  village  of 
Harvington  charms  the  eye  with  another  picture  of 
half-timbered  houses  lifted  picturesquely  above  a 
steep  pitch  and  turn  in  the  road,  among  a  blaze  of 
cottage  gardens  sobered  by  the  shade  of  stately  elms. 
On  the  river,  too,  below  Harvington  is  one  of  those 
ancient  paved  fords  which  Mr.  Quinton's  brush  has 
here  happily  reproduced.  Not  far  from  it  is  a  weir 
with  its  sighing  willows  and  whispering  reeds,  into 
which  the  waters,  driving  before  the  force  of  their 
recent  tumble,  make  continual  stir  and,  with  the 
rustling  of  the  summer  wind,  a  pleasant  harmony. 

But  Salford  Priors,  the  next  village  to  Harvington 
on  the  Stratford  road,  and  the  first  in  Warwickshire 
to  greet  the  pilgrim  from  the  west  bound  for  the 
national  shrine,  does  that  county  credit,  though  part 
of  its  undeniable  charm  is  derived  from  the  high  quality 
of  the  Avon  scenery  in  its  immediate  neighbourhood 
and  the  delightful  walk  over  the  meadows  to  Cleeve 
Mill.  Salford  Priors  would  scarcely,  I  think,  earn  a 
second  glance  in  winter-time  from  the  passing  traveller. 
How  much  of  Warwickshire  would  do  so  ?  To  the 
lover  of  English  scenery  it  is  as  essentially  a  summer 
county  as  in  the  minds  of  the  smart  hunting  world  it  is 
a  winter  one.  This  is  by  no  means  to  overlook  the 
beauties  of  detail  in  an  English  winter  landscape.  I 
trust  we  all  recognize  them,  though  to  express  such  a 
wish  is,  after  all,  mere  cant.  For  we  know  perfectly 
well  that  there  are  thousands  of  quite  intelligent  and 


2o6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

sensitive  souls  who  feel  the  delights  of  a  summer 
landscape  in  their  very  marrow,  but  have  no  joy  what- 
ever in  a  normal  winter  scene.  Nor  will  all  the  inde- 
fatigable essayists  of  the  Press,  who  try  so  hard  through 
the  dark  months  to  convert  their  public  to  an  appre- 
ciation of  an  ordinary  country-side  in  winter,  make,  I 
fear,  much  impression,  let  their  discourse  he  never  so 
eloquent  on  pearly  grey  skies,  the  delicate  tracery  of 
the  naked  elm,  the  red  thongs  of  the  willow,  the  tawny 
beauties  of  withered  reeds.  This  is  too  meticulous 
for  the  majority  of  people  who  feel  the  luxuriance, 
the  colouring  of  summer,  its  sparkle  and  sunshine  in 
their  very  blood  and  bones.  It  is  of  no  use  :  they  do 
not  care  for  sodden  fields  whether  ploughed  or  in  grass, 
for  naked  hedges  or  leafless  woods,  and  the  brimming 
turgid  stream  chills  them  the  more.  Now  winter 
among  the  moors,  the  mountains,  or  the  downs  is 
almost  as  stimulating  as  summer  even  to  the  uncritical 
eye.  The  fen  country  or  Romney  Marsh  has  at  least 
the  obvious  appeal  of  spacious  solitude  to  many  who 
have  nevertheless  little  use  for  the  ordinary  enclosed 
low-country  landscape  on  dull  winter  days,  and  of 
such  beyond  any  quibbling  is  Warwickshire  and  more 
than  half  of  England.  It  is  luxuriant  or  nothing. 
The  picturesque  village,  in  which  the  western  and 
southern  parts  of  the  county  particularly,  like  their 
neighbours,  greatly  excel,  loses  much  more  than  half 
its  charm,  when  the  flowers  and  vines  are  dead,  when 
the  thatch  is  sodden,  the  walls  damp  and  moisture 
exudes  from  the  muddy  street.  One  thing,  however, 
an  English  winter  enjoys  which  no  other  country 
can  boast  of,  though  perhaps  the  English  eye, 
inured  to  it  and  conceiving  of  nothing  else,  gets  little 
satisfaction  therefrom,  and  that  is  the  green  carpet  of 
turf,  only  less  green  than  in  its  matchless  summer  dress, 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  207 

which  still  clothes  the  land  and  still  glows,  if  with 
modified  glory,  when  winter  suns  deign  to  shine.  But 
to  the  alien  from  almost  any  country,  above  all  to  the 
American,  accustomed  to  see  all  colour  vanish  from 
the  pastures  with  the  first  hard  frost,  this  is  a  spec- 
tacle of  rare  delight,  unexpected,  inconceivable.  And 
Warwickshire  can  show  more  of  this  velvet  carpet  in 
winter  than  most  counties,  though  not  so  much  as  some. 
But  this  scarcely  counts  with  an  Englishman,  who  is  so 
used  to  it,  that  he  often  lives  and  dies  unaware  that 
Great  Britain  has  one  priceless  winter  beauty  that  no 
other  country  which  in  any  way  approximates  to  its 
seasons  has  any  approach  to,  while  those  of  the 
tropical  or  Sunny  South  variety  have  of  course  no 
greensward  worthy  of  the  name. 

But  for  an  Englishman  who  has  never  lived  abroad 
long  enough  to  don  at  will  the  spectacles  of  an  alien, 
and  looks  upon  fresh  green  turf  as  earth's  normal 
covering,  Warwickshire  is  most  essentially  a  summer 
country,  offering  nothing  at  all  in  winter  that  you 
might  not  find  in  any  part  of  those  English  counties 
whose  scenery  is  of  the  low-pitched  and  domestic 
order.  Being  Shakespeare's  county  it  has  suffered  a 
good  deal,  like  Devonshire  for  less  obvious  reasons, 
from  undue  idealization.  It  is  also  geographically  the 
heart  of  England,  a  situation  which  conduces  to  senti- 
ment. One  of  course  makes  infinite  allowance  for  the 
writer  who  is  enlarging  upon  his  native  county.  But 
when  I  opened  a  recent  book  on  Warwickshire  and  read 
in  the  opening  paragraph  that  it  was  "  pre-eminently  a 
county  of  hills  and  purling  streams  ",  it  was  impossible 
to  resist  the  conclusion  that  the  ecstatic  native  had  lost 
both  his  sense  of  proportion  and  his  sense  of  humour. 
There  are  hills,  unquestionably,  in  Warwickshire, 
neither  more  nor  less  than  there  are  in  its  neighbours 


2o8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of  Leicester,  Northants,  Oxford,  and  Bedford,  on  the 
one  side,  but  in  no  wise  comparable  to  those  of  its 
immediate  neighbours  on  the  other.  Its  not  very- 
numerous  or  conspicuous  streams  undoubtedly  relax 
at  times  from  the  normal  sluggishness  of  Midland 
brooks.  But  what  a  description  in  brief  of  one  of  the 
forty-four  counties  that  include,  let  us  say,  Cumber- 
land, Yorkshire,  and  Devon  !  Another  more  or  less 
local  enthusiast  but  well-known  writer,  who  really 
ought  to  know  better,  informed  the  readers  of  a 
popular  magazine  the  other  day  that  a  majority  of 
persons  throughout  England  would  unquestionably 
put  their  own  county  first  and  Warwickshire  second  ! 
This  on  the  principle,  one  may  suppose,  that  the  average 
person  is  as  obsessed  of  his  own  surroundings  and  as 
devoid  of  discernment  in  a  most  interesting  topic  as 
a  writer  who  could  quite  seriously  put  such  nonsense 
about  his  own  county  in  print,  as  if  imparting  a 
recognized  fact  to  innocent  dwellers  in  towns  and 
suburbs  !  For  one  thing,  it  is  quite  obvious  that 
people  who  write  in  such  a  strain  of  scenes  like  this,  and 
there  are  numbers  of  them,  have  no  intimacy  with 
the  northern  and  western  temperament  as  regards 
landscape.  They  do  not  understand  how  the  limita- 
tions of  what  may  be  called  domestic  English  scenery 
depress  it,  nor  how  difficult  it  is  for  those  habit- 
uated by  uprearing  or  residence  to  the  more  uplifted 
counties  to  see  eye  to  eye  with  those  whose  standards 
are  different,  and  who  cannot  even  imagine  the  tem- 
perament that  absolutely  demands  for  its  satisfaction 
certain  leading  elements  in  landscape  which  about 
two-thirds  of  the  counties  of  England  entirely  lack. 
Inadequately  these  elements  might  be  indicated  as 
hills  high  enough  to  touch  the  imagination,  the  presence 
of  frequent  and  stirring  waters,  and  of  interludes  of 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  209 

solitude  intermingled  with  or  adjacent  to  the  tame. 
In  such  counties  there  is  a  racier  atmosphere.  Their 
traditions  are  more  inspiring,  or  at  least  more  in 
evidence.  The  native  of  such  regions  never  gets  really 
reconciled  to  the  low-lying,  domestic  scenery  of  Eng- 
land. All  of  it  is  beautiful,  thanks  mainly  in  these 
lower  counties  to  the  manner  in  which  man  has 
treated  it  during  the  last  two  or  three  centuries. 

The  cult  of  a  particular  region  may  be  pursued  by 
a  resident  or  constant  visitor  till  he  becomes  so 
enamoured  of  it  that  he  mistakes  the  endearments 
of  association  and  charms  that  he  could  find  almost 
anywhere  under  the  same  conditions  for  a  quite 
special  achievement  of  nature.  Warwickshire  is  not 
only  the  worthy  cult  of  the  native  who  loves  it  and 
writes  of  it  often  in  a  strain  misleading  to  outsiders, 
but  it  has  suffered  no  little,  like  Devonshire,  which  it 
resembles  in  no  other  respect,  from  the  elementary 
gush  of  the  artless  and  the  geographically  restricted. 
Stratford,  for  one  thing,  thanks  mainly  to  our  American 
visitors,  has  made  it  somewhat  the  fashion,  while 
identical  districts  adjoining  it  stUl  suffer  from  the  re- 
putation for  scenic  deficiency  that  Warwickshire  also 
most  unquestionably  enjoyed  when  I  was  young. 

Now  the  Avon  rises  in  Northamptonshire  and  in 
its  infancy  flows  through  a  portion  of  that  county  of 
squires,  spires,  and  mires  (though  drainage  has  long 
banished  the  last  and  bad  times,  and  taxation  very 
nearly  exterminated  the  first)  which  I  happen  to 
know  tolerably  well  for  the  best  of  reasons.  And 
furthermore  the  grass  country  about  Brixworth,  Guils- 
borough,  and  again  towards  Crick,  all  in  Northampton- 
shire, is  unsurpassed  for  shapely  outline  and  peaceful 
luxuriance  and  fine  timber  anywhere  in  the  Midlands. 
So  far  from  being  low-pitched  and  monotonous  in 
14 


210  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

contour,  some  of  the  hills  upon  the  highway  in  west 
Northantsarenot  merely longbut  marked  "Dangerous". 
The  heights  of  Crick,  through  which  burrows  the  longest 
tunnel  in  England,  that  of  Kilsby,  look  down  on  the 
plains  of  Warwickshire  and  the  course  of  the  Upper 
Avon  from  an  elevation  of  some  600  feet.  But  I  will 
undertake  to  say,  or  what  is  much  more  to  the  point, 
a  London  house  agent,  as  I  have  some  reason  for 
knowing,  will  tell  you  at  once  that  a  country  rectory 
or  its  equivalent,  advertised  for  a  summer  holiday 
"  let  "  in  the  uninspiring  low-pitched  country  about 
Rugby  would  command  respectful  attention  from  a 
stranger,  whereas  an  equally  eligible  domicile  ten  or 
fifteen  miles  away  in  the  cream  of  Midland  scenery 
would  receive  no  consideration.  This  is  because  the 
former  is  in  Warwickshire  and  the  latter  is  in  North- 
amptonshire, and  it  is  very  funny  but  quite  character- 
istic of  the  British  public.  The  outside  reputation  of 
Northants,  as  every  one  who  lives  in  it  and  goes  at  all 
about  the  world  knows  well,  is  in  the  matter  of  scenery 
deplorable.  Great  as  it  is  with  the  hunting  man  and 
the  ecclesiologist,  the  birth-county  of  the  Avon  is 
otherwise  taboo.  Warwickshire  used  to  go  with  it, 
but  has  long  emerged  and  been  promoted  in  the  scale, 
even  to  being  labelled,  as  I  have  already  said,  however 
extravagantly,  the  most  beautiful  county  in  England. 
This  too  is  unjust  to  Northamptonshire,  since,  taken 
as  a  whole,  the  two  may  be  bracketed  together  with 
less  hesitation  than  perhaps  any  other  neighbouring 
counties.  But  Shakespeare  was  born  in  Warwickshire, 
and  to  this  quite  irrelevant  fact  the  physical  exaltation 
of  one  at  the  expense  of  the  other  is  unquestionably 
due.  Even  the  Baconian,  we  feel  sure,  would  follow 
up  the  advertisement  of  the  house  in  Warwickshire, 
shocked  as  he  might  be  to  realize  precisely  why  he 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  211 

did  so,  while  wholly  rejecting  the  notion  of  a  holiday 
in  Northants.  Till  near  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
century  the  well-groomed  and  smoother  counties  of 
England  stood  beyond  doubt  for  the  highest  expression 
of  natural  beauty.  North  Wales,  in  the  language  of 
a  seventeenth  century  explorer,  was  "  a  horrid  spot  of 
hills".  Men  had  been  surfeited  with  wild  nature,  its 
swamps,  tangled  woods,  unreclaimed  common,  and 
obstructing  hills,  difficult  then  of  passage.  The 
smooth,  drained  pasture  land,  the  heavier  and  cleaner 
grain  crops  of  vastly  improved  farming,  the  green 
sweep  of  parkland,  the  handsome  mansion  in  the 
Italian  style — all  these  delighted  them.  The  nature 
poet  liked  a  grotto,  overlooking  an  artificial  lake  with 
deer  feeding  in  a  park  upon  the  farther  bank.  He 
liked,  too,  to  turn  his  eyes  occasionally  over  the  "  teem- 
ing plain,"  the  ripening  grain,  the  grazing  bullocks, 
the  tapering  spires,  the  thatched  villages  (of  doubtful 
artistic  appeal,  however,  to  his  eyes),  sheltering,  as  it 
pleased  him  to  think, ' 'contented  swains  " ,  He  admired 
this,  of  which  Warwickshire  had  abundance,  as  we 
admire  it,  in  a  different  fashion.  We  are  the  products 
of  a  congested  country  or  an  over-elaborate  civilization. 
For  the  last  century  or  more,  though  we  admire  the 
ornate,  we  have  most  of  us  longed  for,  and  most  of  us 
sought,  the  wild,  the  uplifted,  and  the  less  trim.  But, 
to  the  Georgian,  the  triumph  of  art  over  a  ragged 
England  was  too  recent  for  what  some  one  has  termed 
the  "  call  of  the  wild  "  to  have  much  significance  to 
generations  who  were  only  emerging  from  it.  One 
hears,  too,  a  great  deal  of  the  forests.  Your  Warwick- 
shire vates  sacer  will  tell  you,  and  of  truth,  how  the 
forest  of  Arden  and  others  locked  their  boughs  so 
closely  over  a  large  portion  of  the  county  that  a  squirrel 
could  travel  across  it  without  touching  the  ground. 


212  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

The  inference  is,  and  is  intended,  that  this  was  a  con- 
dition peculiar  to  Warwickshire,  and  is  a  picturesque 
point  for  the  visitor.  "  Shakespeare's  green  wood  " 
makes  a  nice-sounding  phrase,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact 
it  was  common  to  many  counties.  Worcestershire, 
North  Wilts,  Sussex,  and  others  possessed  similar 
forests  offering  the  same  facilities  to  the  squirrel,  and 
are  still  fond  of  recalling  it  by  means  of  the  same 
idiom.  One  must  not  forget,  too,  the  extraordinary 
change  that  has  overtaken  the  open  landscape  of 
England  since  Shakespeare's  day,  a  change  that  may 
be  said  to  have  virtually  created  much  of  the  particular 
form  of  beauty  that  distinguishes  the  Midlands.  Let 
us  try  to  imagine  a  patchwork  of  a  hundred  or  so 
acres  round  the  village  in  small  plots  of,  to  modern 
notions,  incredibly  attenuated  crops  of  grain,  relieved 
scarcely  at  all  by  the  blossom-laden  hedges  as  we 
know  them.  A  hay  meadow  here  and  there,  but  all 
the  rest  of  the  country  not  afforested,  a  ragged  pasture, 
rich  or  poor,  drained  or  undrained,  as  nature  made 
it ;  tufted  with  scrub  or  thickets  and  picked  over  by 
stunted  cattle  and  sheep  that  would  appal  a  modern 
farmer  and  any  American,  unless  indeed  he  were 
familiar  with  the  old  broomsedge  regions  of  Virginia 
and  the  Carolinas,  where  may  be  seen  to-day  their 
precise  counterparts  as  well  as  the  five  or  six  bushels  of 
wheat  to  the  acre  that  represented  the  Shakespearean 
crop.  This  dishevelled  infertility  will  not  have  de- 
tracted from  the  landscape  of  bolder  counties  to  any- 
thing like  the  same  extent  as  the  Midlands.  And  yet 
further,  in  regard  to  our  American  visitors,  England, 
it  must  be  said  again,  looks  quite  different  in  their 
eyes,  till  long  habit  has  dulled  the  early  impressions, 
from  what  it  appears  in  those  of  the  native.  Ordinary, 
normal,  gracious,  ornate  England  is  what  in  the  main 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  213 

delights  an  American  for  reasons  obvious  enough  to 
any  one  who  has  at  any  time  lived  long  enough  in 
America  to  understand  what  England  looks  like  to  a 
stranger.  Our  picturesque  regions  are  and  should  be, 
for  them,  secondary  and  deferred  indulgences.  And 
no  part  of  England  is  better  calculated  to  furnish  the 
smooth  velvety  surface,  the  lush  hedgerows,  the  old- 
fashioned  villages,  the  grey  church  towers,  the  ancient 
farm  and  manor  houses,  than  the  Midlands  of  which 
Warwickshire  is  the  heart.  We  in  England,  unless  we 
live  in  a  town,  look  upon  these  things  every  day  of 
our  lives,  and  they  are  as  nothing.  The  untravelled 
native,  which  may  in  this  sense  include  the  occasional 
visitor  to  the  Continent,  accepts  them  as  the  ordinary 
covering  of  the  earth's  surface.  By  no  process  can 
he  imagine  how  novel  and  delightful  these  common 
everyday  things  look  to  transatlantic  eyes,  nor  merely 
those  of  the  man  of  taste  and  culture,  but  even  of  the 
plain,  unlettered  store-keeper  on  a  Cook's  ticket. 
Englishmen  are  constantly  expressing  surprise  at  these 
raptures.  They  understand  those  directed  to  the  old 
buildings,  the  churches,  and  castles.  But  most  of 
them  know  enough  of  America  to  reahse  that  the 
people  of  the  old  States,  at  any  rate,  emerged  from  the 
woods  a  very  long  time  ago  and  must  have  lived  in 
the  presence  of  pastures  and  meadows,  grain-fields, 
highways,  fences,  homesteads,  and  the  other  accessories 
of  normal  rural  life,  all  their  lives,  which  is  undoubtedly 
a  fact.  It  is  also  another  that  the  country  which  many 
of  our  visitors  are  in  the  habit  of  seeing  around  their 
homes  is  approximately  as  clean  and  tidy,  as  sub- 
stantially built  upon,  covered  with  virtually  the  same 
crops,  laid  out  too  in  fields  of  the  English  pattern  and 
size  and  diversified  with  about  the  same  amount  of 
woodland,  not  differing  seriously  in  ingredients  from 


214  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

our  own — in  short,  from  Eastern  Canada  inclusive  to 
Maryland,  the  same  material  civilization,  minus  the 
architectural  antiquities  that  distinguish  the  country 
through  which  the  Avon  flows,  exist  in  America.  Nor 
is  this  American  rural  civilization  by  any  means 
always  that  of  yesterday.  A  good  deal  of  it  is  on 
foundations  laid  in  the  seventeenth  century,  when 
Warwickshire  bore  very  little  resemblance  to  the 
picture  which  ravishes  the  descendant  of  the  original 
emigrant  to-day.  But  with  all  this  an  English  land- 
scape, even  apart  from  buildings,  differs  absolutely 
from  the  other,  as  indeed  it  differs  from  all  or  almost 
all  others  in  the  world.  Yet  this  quality  and  pro- 
digious contrast  is  practically  indescribable.  The 
ablest  Americans  have  attempted  over  and  over  again 
to  express  in  print  their  first  impressions  of  England. 
But  I  think  it  may  fairly  be  said  that  they  have  done 
little  to  mitigate  the  shock  of  delighted  surprise  that 
their  countryman,  possessed  of  an  eye  to  see  and  a 
heart  to  feel,  experiences  on  his  first  introduction  to 
the  real  thing.  It  is  therefore  a  happy  circumstance 
that  Shakespeare  was  born  in  Warwickshire,  and  that 
the  faithful  pilgrim  to  his  shrine  from  beyond  the  seas 
should  concurrently  make  acquaintance  with  the  part 
of  England  that  is  at  least  as  good  for  his  purposes 
as  any  that  he  could  select,  and  better  than  most. 
In  the  interest  of  historic  truth,  however,  he  must 
remember  that  when  he  is  looking  over  modern 
Warwickshire  he  is  not  looking  upon  the  rural  Warwick- 
shire that  Shakespeare  knew,  or,  save  for  the  contour 
of  the  ground,  anything  like  it.  It  is  possible  that 
nineteen  Englishmen  out  of  twenty  may  need  this 
painful  reminder  fully  as  much. 

Salford,  where  we  came  to  a  halt  so  many  pages  back, 
it  may  be  for  that  very  reason  necessary  to  repeat,  is 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  215 

one  of  the  pleasantest  spots  in  Warwickshire,  coming 
back  to  one  as  a  small  group  of  cheerful  dwellings  of 
all  degrees  standing  in  roomy  enclosures  on  either  side 
of  the  road  ;  a  fine  old  church  with  a  bowery  parsonage 
set  close  at  hand  in  a  meadow,  and  a  delightful  walk 
through  green  hedge-bordered  pastures  to  the  prettiest 
of  all  the  Warwickshire  reaches  of  the  Avon.  The 
name  is  derived  from  a  salt  spring  that  once  bubbled 
up  in  the  village.  The  manor  was  part  of  the  spoils 
snatched  by  the  Crown  from  the  abbey  of  Evesham, 
and  eventually  went  to  help  in  paying  the  debts  of 
that  unattractive  pedant,  the  first  James.  Among 
the  subsequent  owners  are  the  well-known  Warwick- 
shire family  of  Skipwith,  whose  monuments,  with 
others,  may  be  seen  in  the  church.  But  the  property 
has  long  been  absorbed  in  the  great  estates  of  the 
Marquis  of  Hertford,  whose  mansion  and  park  of 
Ragley  is  but  a  few  miles  distant,  near  Alcester.  The 
church  is  well  placed  and  interesting  above  the  common, 
numbering  among  its  treasures  a  beautifully  moulded 
Norman  doorway,  a  Norman  nave,  and  a  thirteenth 
century  chancel.  Besides  a  good  tower  at  the  west  end 
there  is  a  small  sexagonal  one  with  image  niches  and 
gargoyles  abutting  on  the  exterior  of  the  south  aisle, 
which  attracts  the  eye  at  once,  and  is  in  part  very 
early  work.  Grotesque  gargoyles  too  are  conspicuous 
on  the  tower  and  elsewhere,  representing  men  and 
birds  and  griffins. 

The  half-mile  walk  to  Cleeve  Mill  from  Salford 
always  comes  back  to  me  with  little  effort,  and  in  a 
somewhat  crowded  mental  gallery  is  always  welcome. 
Possibly  one  was  in  a  mood  to  enjoy  small  things,  for 
it  was  a  sunny  August  afternoon,  and  a  light  breeze 
played  in  the  luxuriant  straggling  hedges,  through 
which    the    pleasant    springy   pathway,    trodden    by 


2i6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

sanguine  anglers,  pushed  on  towards  the  woody  height 
above  the  river,  where  the  warm  wind  danced  among 
a  myriad  leaves.  This  is  the  Marie  cliff  which,  wooded 
below  and  bare  above,  rises  to  a  considerable  height. 
But  at  the  mill  at  the  foot  of  the  cliff,  girdled  about 
with  forest  trees,  the  scene  was  charming  ;  a  sparkling 
weir  of  sloping  rugged  stones,  crossed  by  a  long  bridge 
of  a  single  plank,  a  plunging  mill-stream  and  a  fine 
dance  and  swirl  of  water  below  among  little  islands 
tufted  with  willows  and  rushes,  displaying  a  beautiful 
glimpse  of  a  still  reach  overhung  with  foliage.  Above 
the  mill  and  the  weir  and  all  the  lively  stir  of  waters 
a  long,  silent  deep  stretches  towards  Bidford,  over 
which  more  woods  throw  their  shadows.  Climbing 
the  steep  hill  beyond  the  river,  where  an  old  monolith 
squats  by  the  road,  a  short  walk  brings  one  to  Cleeve 
Prior,  and  once  again  on  to  Worcestershire  soil. 

Five  hundred  feet  above  the  Severn  valley,  on  the 
long  high  plateau  above  the  Avon  known  as  Cleeve 
Hill — not  to  be  confounded  with  the  much  loftier 
Cotswold  height  above  Cheltenham — stands  the  church 
and  village  of  Cleeve  Prior,  as  satisfactory  a  termina- 
tion to  a  summer  afternoon's  stroll,  adventured  from 
Salford,  where  there  is  a  station,  as  could  be  desired. 
For  at  Cleeve  Prior  there  is  almost  everything  that 
makes  for  the  ideal  village.  A  small  Tudor  house  of 
forlorn  and  unprotected  aspect  set  by  the  road,  seems 
to  tell  some  uncommon  story  at  the  very  entrance  ; 
but  all  I  could  make  of  it  was  its  occupation  by  the 
same  old  lady  for  three  hundred  and  three  years,  as 
witnessed  by  a  tomb  in  the  churchyard,  which  placed 
the  matter  of  course  beyond  dispute. 

There  is  something  of  a  village  green  too,  shaded  by 
a  single  great  oak  with  vast  but  hollow  trunk.  Low- 
browed cottages  stand  flush  with  the  green,  or  with- 


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EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  217 

draw  enticingly  behind  small  leafy  gardens  where  the 
lusty  growth  of  some  box  trees  has  tempted  an  owner 
here  and  there  to  topiary  decoration.  You  may 
refresh  yourself  at  the  "  King's  Arms  ",  a  village  inn  of 
extraordinary  antiquity,  said  to  be  in  great  part  of 
the  fourteenth  century  and  looking  credibly  so.  The 
church,  with  lofty  embattled  tower,  stands  precisely 
where  it  should  in  a  village  that  has  slowly  and  fortuit- 
ously grouped  itself  with  the  centuries  into  the  happy 
disposal  of  its  body  and  limbs,  as  if  arranged  to  sit 
for  its  picture  by  some  painter  of  judgment  and  dis- 
cretion. The  church  has  a  tower,  a  nave,  and  a 
chancel,  with  a  modern  south  transept  of  brick.  There 
are  two  Norman  doorways  in  the  nave,  with  some  good 
Early  English  windows  and  a  decorated  but  restored 
chancel.  Across  a  meadow  behind  the  church,  screened 
by  high  trees  and  luxuriant  garden  foliage,  and  its 
front  door  approached  through  a  wicket  in  a  low  old 
wall,  between  most  quaintly  clipped  and  lofty  yew 
hedges,  is  a  beautiful  little  Tudor  manor  house.  This 
puts  the  finishing  touch,  as  it  were,  to  as  happy  a  picture 
of  an  old  English  village  as  one  might  wish  to  enjoy 
a  well-earned  tea  in  of  a  summer  afternoon.  Talking 
of  the  Enclosure  Acts,  which  incidentally  contributed  so 
much  to  the  beauty  of  modern  England,  Americans 
might  care  to  know  that  this  parish  of  Cleeve  Prior 
was  legally  handed  over  to  hedgerows  and  improved 
farming  in  the  year  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 
The  Icknield  way,  the  chief  Roman  road  of  all  this 
country,  runs  a  direct  course  through  the  parish  as 
a  modern  road  from  south  to  north  crossing  the  Avon 
at  the  large  village  of  Bidford,  the  next  point  on  the 
river  above  Cleeve  Mill.  It  is  not,  therefore,  surprising 
that  a  goodly  store  of  Roman  coins  and  many  fragments 
of  armour  and  other  relics  have  been  from  time  to 


2i8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

time  unearthed  about  Cleeve  Prior,  suggesting  the 
probabihty  that  there  was  a  small  Roman  station 
here. 

But  before  going  eastward  again  into  Warwickshire 
and  Stratford  way,  there  are  the  three  Worcestershire 
Littletons  lying  in  a  group  a  mile  or  two  beyond  Cleeve 
Prior  ;  villages  quite  off  the  main  track  but  immedi- 
ately on  the  path  of  such  more  enterprising  pilgrims 
as  might  be  disposed  to  journey  back  to  Evesham 
from  Salford  station,  on  the  southern  side  of  the  Avon. 
The  few  parishes  here  between  the  Avon  and  Honey- 
bourne  and  the  villages  along  the  foot  of  the  first 
rise  of  the  Cotswolds  are  threaded  by  many  lanes ; 
not  deep  tortuous  ones  that  bury  you  more  or  less  as 
you  travel,  but  narrow  roads  rather,  of  a  good  surface, 
and  wonderfully  generous  margin,  abandoned  to  a 
profuse  tangle  of  flowers  and  foliage,  that  are  a 
dehght  in  themselves  and  save  the  otherwise  uneventful 
byway  from  ever  palling  on  the  most  leisurely  pro- 
gress along  it.  One  that  I  followed  on  several  occasions 
along  the  edge  of  these  sequestered  parishes  in  July 
and  August  always  abides  with  me.  I  think  it  was  a 
section  of  the  old  Icknieldway  just  alluded  to.  But 
no  matter,  it  always  had  for  me  at  least  a  curious 
fascination,  not  readily  imparted ;  possibly  a  fanciful 
and  capricious  one,  but  if  so,  one  may  always  be 
thankful  by  the  winter  fireside  for  such  fancies  and 
such  caprices.  It  ran  for  nearly  a  mile  from  one  cross- 
road to  another  with  almost  the  precision,  as  it  seemed 
in  the  pursuit  of  it,  of  a  ruled  line.  Ordinary  grass- 
fields  with  intervals  of  seeds  or  tillage  here  and  there 
lay  on  either  hand.  Neither  farmhouse  nor  cottage 
nor  any  sign  of  humanity  sat  either  upon  it  or  within 
sight,  while  the  languor  of  high  summer  resting  heavily 
upon  its  exuberant   growths  in  field   and  hedgerow 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  219 

and  roadside  suggested  the  spirit  of  solitude  under  an 
aspect  one  is  hardly  accustomed  to  look  for  it.  It 
was  not  till  the  second  or  third  occasion  of  making 
its  acquaintance  that  the  consistently  secluded 
qualities  of  this  old  Roman  road,  if  such  it  were,  began 
to  seize  my  fancy  and  thenceforward  to  draw  me  more 
than  once  out  of  the  ordinary  route  for  the  mere 
gratification  of  treading  its  untravelled  and  flower- 
margined  surface.  In  mediaeval  times  we  know  that 
highways  were  by  law  70  yards  wide,  partly  as  a 
precaution  against  the  predatory  individuals  who 
infested  them,  and  partly,  no  doubt,  as  now  in  the 
more  backward  old  States  of  America  which  have 
scarcely  even  yet  begun  road-making,  that  water-logged 
or  impassable  tracks  may  be  temporarily  abandoned 
for  new  ones.  But  neither  cause,  it  would  be  irrele- 
vant to  remark,  is  the  occasion  of  the  wide  grassy 
margins  that  are  so  often  found  on  both  highways  and 
byways  in  the  Midlands ;  more  particularly  on  the 
former,  where  the  grass  for  many  reasons  is  not  greatly 
invaded  by  the  products  of  the  neighbouring  hedgerows. 
But  here  in  these  silent  byways,  where  no  strings  of 
horses  are  cantered  by  grooms,  where  no  gipsies  camp, 
nor  cows  graze,  the  occasional  grassy  margin  becomes 
a  gorgeous  tangle.  On  this  particular  mile  of  unfre- 
quented road  every  tree  and  flower  in  the  whole  flora 
of  the  west  Midlands  must  in  their  due  season  surely 
find  a  place.  Full-grown  trees  were  scarce,  and  on 
this  account  no  doubt  the  sunshine  has  the  better 
germinated  this  mile-long  strip  of  Nature's  garden. 
In  the  hedgerow,  willows  unpruned  this  many  a  year 
though  once  pollarded,  and  ash  trees  spreading  in  fan- 
shaped  fashion,  made  a  lofty  screen,  till  some  tangle 
of  elm  and  hazel,  of  maple,  elder,  thorn,  beech,  and  sloe 
took  up  the  tale.     And  with  these  in  confusion  blended. 


220  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

spreading  out  and  poaching  on  the  grassy  margin  of 
the  road,  were  gorse  and  broom,  and  brier-roses  and 
blackberries,  while  over  all  the  honeysuckle  and  the 
traveller's  joy  lay  in  endless  festoons.    In  their  intervals 
and  in  the  broad  edging  of  tangled  grass  yet  left  by 
the  roadside  came  the  flowers,  the  wdllow  herb,  as  ever 
in   the    parts  to  the  front,  loose-strife  and  the  wild 
vetch,  convolvuli,  scabious,  with  yarrow,  corn-cockles 
and  the  golden  ragwort,  while  here  and  there  in  a 
damper  spot  the  ivory  tassels  of  the  fragrant  meadow- 
sweet   scented    the    air.     That   all   the  birds  in  the 
neighbourhood  seemed  to  have  gathered  to  this  quiet 
harbourage  by  a  roadside  which  no  one  seemed  to 
travel,  and  furnished  such  a  harvest  of  seed  and  fruit 
and    berry,    was    natural    enough.     And    among    the 
clatter  of  blackbirds,  thrushes,  and  starlings,  and  the 
commoner   members   of   the    smaller    tribes,   a  green 
woodpecker  would   occasionally   jerk   away  with   his 
hoarse  note  of  alarm,  or  even  a  jay  or  two,  tempted 
from   the   security   of   some   neighbouring   woodland. 
And  there  was  nearly  always  a  covey  of  early  hatched 
partridges  dusting  somewhere  on  the  narrow  road.     I 
remember,  too,  on  the  back  of  an  ancient  cowshed,  the 
only  building  anywhere  in  evidence,  a  printed  notice- 
board,  cracked  and  stained  with  age,  threatening,  on 
behalf  of  proprietors  long  dead,  dire  retribution  against 
potential    poachers    and    trespassers    that    must    also 
have  been  mouldering  in  their  graves  for  a  generation. 
There  is  something  pathetic  about  these  time-eaten, 
weather-stained,   half-legible  notice-boards   that    here 
and  there  in  remote  spots  have  escaped  destruction ; 
their  faded   and    truculent  threats  seem  so  eloquent 
of  another  age  and  so  grimly  suggestive  of  Botany 
Bay  and  days  long  before  the  shadow  of  the  coming 
cataclysm  had  begun  to  darken  the  pathway  of  the 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  221 

squire.  When  land  was  a  power,  enviable  and  unassail- 
able, and  everything  was  snug — except  the  wages  of 
the  agricultural  labourer,  to  whom  the  snaring  of  a 
rabbit  must  have  been  as  irresistible  a  temptation  in 
the  face  of  his  nine  shillings  a  week  and  hungry  family 
as  was  ever  set  daily  before  the  eyes  of  half-fed  human 
beings.  This  condition  of  things  seems  all  the  stranger 
now  when  the  rabbit  has  dropped  out  of  favour  in  the 
serious  sportsman's  estimate,  and  professional  trappers 
for  curtailing  their  numbers  are  in  such  great  demand. 
Of  the  three  Littletons,  North,  Middle,  and  South, 
the  two  latter  only  have  churches,  both  of  which 
are  interesting.  It  may  be  worth  noting  in  connexion 
with  a  family  so  vigorous  for  many  centuries  in  Wor- 
cestershire, and  never  more  conspicuous  in  the  world's 
eye  than  now,  that  the  Littletons  derived  their  name 
from  these  villages,  being  landowners  here,  though  ap- 
parently never  residents,  before  they  went  to  Frankly  in 
the  fifteenth  century.  Middle-Littleton  Church,  where 
there  is  nothing  of  a  village,  is  a  quite  striking  cruciform 
building,  but  with  a  very  short  south  transept .  Like  most 
of  the  churches  in  this  region  it  is  a  blend  of  periods 
from  Norman  to  Perpendicular.  It  has  an  embattled 
west  tower,  while  the  south  transept  is  a  chapel  erected 
in  the  fifteenth  century  by  Thomas  Smith,  whose  family 
for  some  generations  flourished  here  "  under  license  of 
my  Lord  Abbot  of  Evesham",  to  which  monastery 
the  manor  belonged.  The  nave  is  Early  English  and 
embellished  with  some  good  three-light  and  two-light 
trefoil  windows.  There  are  also  some  fourteenth 
century  tiles  and  some  curiously  carved  oak  pews. 
But  the  wonder  of  Middle  Littleton  is  the  immense 
fourteenth  century  tithe  barn  built  by  Abbot  Ombersley 
of  Evesham  for  the  use  of  the  abbey.  It  is  150  feet 
long,    with    a    roof    supported    by    massive    timbers. 


222  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

while  the  walls  are  strengthened  outside  by  heavy  stone 
buttresses.  It  stands  near  the  church  in  the  outer 
yard  of  a  large  farm,  the  house  of  which  suggests  in 
itself  a  Tudor  origin. 

But  in  South  Littleton,  just  beyond  which  is  some- 
thing of  a  village,  though  not  a  large  one,  there  is  a 
spectacle  fronting  on  the  street,  the  like  of  which 
I  am  quite  sure  you  might  search  all  England  for  in 
vain.  This  is  the  former  residence  of  the  magnates  of 
the  parish,  consisting  of  a  very  complete  specimen  of 
Queen  Anne  mansion  of  date  1727,  united  as  an 
addition  to  an  Elizabethan  house,  a  singular  and  ill- 
assorted  union  of  two  totally  different  styles,  both 
admirable  of  their  kind.  The  Queen  Anne  portion,  too, 
is  of  red  brick,  with  the  characteristic  broad  chimneys 
and  large  dormer  windows,  while  the  other  is  of  grey 
stone  with  the  numerous  sharp  gables  and  casement 
windows  of  the  two  preceding  centuries.  Thrust 
right  on  to  the  village  street,  with  sombre  overgrown 
box  trees  filling  part  of  the  narrow  interval,  more 
than  half  the  large  windows  and  all  the  dormers  of 
the  untenanted  Queen  Anne  portion  are  bricked  or 
boarded  up,  and  there  is  almost  an  uncanny  air  about 
this  fine  relic  of  the  days  of  Walpole  and  the  days  of 
Raleigh  respectively.  The  villagers,  whom  I  addressed 
upon  the  subject,  said  it  had  been  like  this  ever  since 
they  could  remember,  and  knew  nothing  more  except 
that  it  was  for  sale.  Nash,  writing  in  1775,  says 
nothing  of  the  house,  though  something  of  succes- 
sive squires,  its  owners.  The  church  stands  raised 
up  in  a  picturesque  graveyard  sloping  from  the 
village  street,  and  has  a  low  western  tower  with  nave, 
chancel,  south  porch,  and  north  chapel,  and,  like  its 
neighbour,  is  of  all  styles,  but  otherwise  of  no  particular 
interest. 


"€«» 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  223 

Immediately  adjoining  the  Littletons  on  the  east  or 
Stratford  side,  and  keeping  to  the  south  of  the  Avon, 
is  a  group  of  what  may  be  called  Shakespeare  villages 
— Pebworth,  Long  Marston,  and  Welford.  These  are 
all,  by  the  way,  in  Gloucestershire,  which  drives  a 
wedge  right  up  to  Stratford  and  fronts  on  the  Avon 
for  some  miles.  Warwickshire,  through  the  mouth  of 
its  many  prophets,  has  been  singularly  successful  in 
disseminating  the  impression  that  Stratford  lies  in 
the  heart  of  the  county,  that  in  short  it  is  Warwick- 
shire of  Warwickshire,  whereas  it  is  within  a  mile 
or  two  of  being  outside  the  county  altogether.  Shake- 
speare's associations  must  in  actual  fact  have  been 
very  largely  blended  with  the  counties  of  Worcester 
and  Gloucester.  Everybody  knows  the  number  of 
little  local  adventures  with  which  the  Bard  of  Avon 
is  credited,  none  of  them  in  any  way  of  an  elevating 
nature,  but  rather  calculated  to  make  sport  for  the 
Baconian  and  the  agnostic.  A  familiar  quatrain 
anent  a  group  of  villages  to  the  west  of  Stratford  is 
even  attributed  to  Shakespeare  himself  :  "  Piping 
Pebworth,  Dancing  Marston,  Haunted  Hillborough, 
and  Hungry  Grafton  ",  with  "  Dodging  Exhall,  Papist 
Wixford,  Beggarly  Broom,  and  Drunken  Bidford". 
It  is  said  that  after  a  drinking  bout  at  Bidford,  where 
we  shall  shortly  be,  the  poet,  homeward  bound,  extend- 
ed himself  beneath  a  crab  tree  for  the  night,  and  when 
the  cold  dews  of  morning  brought  a  headache  and 
repentance,  he  indicated  in  these  uncomplimentary 
terms  the  various  villages  whence  his  boon-com- 
panions hailed.  "  Piping  "  Pebworth  stands  upon  the 
brow  and  slopes  of  a  leafy  knoll,  crowned  by  a  fine 
old  church  with  wide-spreading  well-filled  graveyard, 
and  consists  of  tower,  nave,  chancel,  and  a  broad 
south  aisle.     The  nave  arcade  is  Norman,  and  there  are 


224  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

several  Norman,  as  well  as  Early  English,  Decorated  and 
Perpendicular  windows.  There  is  a  row,  too,  of  dormers 
in  the  roof  which  has  a  curious  effect.  Marston, 
whose  epithet  seems  to  have  been  earned  by  its 
ancient  propensity  for  Morris  dancing,  spreads  along 
the  flat  a  mile  or  two  beyond  ;  a  long  straight  road 
where  the  cottages  stand  in  gardens  and  orchards 
at  easy  intervals,  with  a  timber  house  or  two  of 
greater  pretensions  blinking  from  among  neighbouring 
groves.  A  small  church  at  a  cross-road  sprang  at 
this  season  from  a  tall  crop  of  grass  long  gone  to  seed 
and,  when  I  saw  it,  entirely  concealing  most  of  the 
headstones  and  monuments  of  the  village  fathers. 

There  is  an  old  endowed  grammar  school  here,  too, 
a  singularly  inapt  site  nowadays  for  an  institution  that 
has  presumably  to  lean  for  support  upon  the  day  boy. 

I  took  my  lunch  at  the  rustic  inn  on  last  passing 
through  Marston.  It  was  a  holiday  of  some  kind. 
The  Old  Age  Pension  Bill  had  been  defined  in  the 
House,  I  think,  the  day  before,  and  a  village  parliament 
sat  in  judgment  upon  it  and  entertained  me  nobly 
while  I  refreshed  myself.  The  gratification  of  some 
was  tempered  by  the  anticipation  of  others,  correct  as 
it  proved,  that  tobacco  and  beer  would  have  in  part  to 
pay  for  it.  The  Marston  people  get  their  drinking 
water  from  ponds  in  their  gardens,  and  the  frog,  I  was 
informed,  played  a  lively  and  conspicuous  part  in  the 
domestic  vessels.  At  the  end  of  the  village  is  the 
house  where  Charles  the  Second,  during  his  adventures 
after  his  flight  from  Worcester,  helped  the  farmer's 
wife  in  her  operations  with  such  small  success.  Bid- 
ford,  however,  drunken  Bidford,  is  the  most  important 
of  the  group,  and  this  brings  us  again  across  the 
river  and  into  Warwickshire.  Bidford  Bridge,  though 
patched  with  brick,  is  mainly  of  stone,  and  is  singu- 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  225 

larly  unconventional,  almost  every  one  of  its  eight 
arches  differing  from  its  neighbour.  The  buttresses 
are  massive,  and  the  date  remote,  probably  fifteenth 
century.  It  was  repaired  at  one  time  with  stones 
from  the  dismantled  priory  at  Alcester,  and  like 
most  of  the  Avon  bridges  was  broken  down  during  the 
Civil  War,  as  more  than  one  skirmish  was  fought  here. 

Altogether  Bidford  Bridge  is  among  the  best  on  a 
river  rich  in  bridges.  The  village,  which  is  on  the 
north  bank,  is  a  large  one,  after  the  style  rather  of  a 
miniature  town,  a  long  street  of  houses  closely  packed 
together.  It  presents  a  more  picturesque  appearance 
from  the  summit  of  the  hill  upon  the  Stratford  road, 
whence  you  descend  upon  it,  or  again  from  the  opposite 
bank  of  the  river  than  when  actually  in  its  streets. 
The  church,  however,  stands  well  up,  with  a  graveyard 
sloping  to  the  river,  and  has  a  curious  tower  with  an 
expanding  base  and  a  projecting  stair  turret  at  one 
of  the  angles  which  overtops  the  battlements.  The 
body  of  the  church  has  been  rebuilt  save  for  an 
Early  English  chancel  lit  on  either  side  by  trefoil- 
headed  windows.  A  monument  and  bust  within,  of 
date  1655,  to  Dorothy  Skipwith,  reminds  one  that 
the  manor  belonged  to  this  still  well-known  War- 
wickshire family.  Much  more  curious  though  would 
seem  the  fact  that  it  belonged  at  one  time  to  Griffith 
ap  Llewelyn,  Prince  of  North  Wales,  though,  as  a 
present  from  King  John,  the  little  mystery  van- 
ishes when  one  remembers  that  his  stepmother  Joan 
was  that  King's  daughter. 

Fronting  the  church  is  a  large  stone  Tudor  building 
with  mullioned  windows,  filling  now  some  modest 
function, but  once  the  "Falcon  Inn",  where  well-known 
but  vague  tradition  credits  Shakespeare  with  having 
encountered  in  a  drinking-bout  the  champions  of  the 

15 


226  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

various  villages,  on  which  by  a  still  vaguer  one  he 
revenged  himself  by  the  jingle  already  quoted.  A 
hotel  on  the  river,  a  beer  garden,  and  every  accommoda- 
tion, including  boats  for  giving  the  Joes  and  Jills  of 
Birmingham  a  happy  day,  keeps  Bidford  from  feeling 
dull.  Even  apart  from  this  the  place  is  scarcely  one 
of  those  villages  that  even  by  frequent  traversing  grow 
in  one's  affections  or  leave  any  enduring  impression  on 
the  mind.  Welford,  however,  some  four  miles  up,  is 
a  very  different  matter.  Mr.  Quinton's  brush  makes 
any  enlargement  upon  the  delightful  scene  that  opens 
to  the  visitor  approaching  it  from  below  the  weir 
superfluous.  The  village  itself  is  not  unworthy  of 
its  river  foreground  with  its  thatched  cottages,  em- 
bowered in  creepers  and  planted  for  the  most  part 
in  gardens  gay  with  flowers  and  fruit.  A  notable 
feature  of  Welford  is  its  old  painted  maypole,  which, 
set  on  a  bank,  towers  75  feet  in  height,  and  is 
coloured  in  stripes  of  red,  blue,  and  white.  This 
reminds  the  local  patriot  that  Shakespeare  makes 
Hermia  call  Helena  in  "  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  "  a 
painted  maypole,  a  reminder  which  leads  up  to  the 
reflection  that  the  Welford  Maypole,  situated  in 
Gloucestershire  by  the  way,  is  probably  a  successor 
to  one  that  stood  there  in  the  poet's  day.  The  church 
is  not  without  interest,  and  has  some  good  Norman 
arches  in  the  nave. 

Between  Bidford  and  Welford  stands  near  the  bank 
of  the  river  an  old  ivy-clad  house  of  Tudor  origin 
named  Hillborough  Manor,  the  "  Haunted  Hill- 
borough  "  of  the  jingle,  so  absurdly  fastened  on  Shake- 
speare. About  a  mile  above  Welford,  the  river  all  this 
time  pursuing  a  meadowy  course,  marked  for  the  most 
part  by  willows,  is  crossed  by  a  curious  double  stone 
bridge  of  thirteen  arches,  resting  its  centre  on  a  leafy 


Of 


:  \ 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  227 

island.  Near  the  end  of  it  is  an  ancient  tavern,  bearing 
the  somewhat  infrequent  sign  of  the  "  Four  Alls ". 
On  the  northern  side  of  the  river  are  several  villages 
distinguished  for  pleasant  unalloyed  rusticity  and 
containing  no  little  good  work  in  their  churches. 

Exhall,  for  instance,  has  a  Norman  doorway  and 
a  thirteenth  century  chancel,  Wicksford  a  Norman 
doorway,  part  of  a  rood  screen  with  some  ancient 
glass  and  interesting  old  monuments.  At  Temple 
Grafton  the  church  has  been  recently  rebuilt,  which 
is  regrettable,  since  it  seems  almost  certain  that  it  was 
in  the  old  church  of  this  picturesquely  seated  village 
that  William  Shakespeare  was  wedded  to  Ann 
Hathaway.  At  any  rate,  what  appears  almost  cer- 
tainly to  be  their  marriage  entry  was  found  on  the 
Worcester  register. 

I  need  hardly  say  that  I  do  not  propose  to  enter 
here  into  the  boundless  controversies  that  rage  around 
the  shadowy  association  of  Shakespeare  with  the 
various  districts  around  his  native  town.  Enough  to 
fill  volumes  has  been  written  upon  the  scanty  tags  and 
fragments  of  evidence  that  unfortunately  are  all  that 
we  have  to  stimulate  the  fancy  in  the  neighbourhood 
upon  which  his  great  name  has  shed  such  lustre. 
Eliminating  Shakespeare  there  can,  I  think,  be  little 
doubt  but  that  the  wanderer,  with  a  fair  knowledge 
of  England  and  her  scenery,  would  begin  to  think  that 
the  Avon  had  given  him  of  her  best,  both  in  her  own 
stream  and  their  environment  as  he  drew  near  Stratford 
and  passed  on  to  Warwick,  saving  always  the  abiding 
interest  of  those  two  widely  different  but  historic 
towns.  The  Warwickshire  country  to  the  north  of 
the  Avon,  reaching  to  Alcester  and  Henley  in  Arden, 
enjoys,  to  be  sure,  the  full  glamour  of  being  Shakespear- 
ean soil.     Alcester  is  a  pleasant  enough  looking  little 


228  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

market  town,  but  otherwise  quite  unremarkable,  with 
a  parish  church  mostly  of  eighteenth  century  date. 
Henley  may  be  dismissed  in  the  same  terms  except  for 
an  old  market  inn  and  a  good  many  timbered  houses 
and  the  extremely  interesting  Norman  church  of 
Beaudesert  just  outside  it,  while  a  couple  of  miles  to 
the  southward  is  the  park  and  seventeenth  century 
Italian  mansion  of  Wootton  Wawen.  Much  more 
interesting,  however,  is  its  large  and  striking  church, 
containing  work  of  every  period  from  Saxon  to  late 
Perpendicular,  and  among  a  store  of  curious  things 
the  dust  of  Somerville,the  poetic  Nimrod  who,  whatever 
the  precise  value  of  his  method  of  expressing  it,  felt 
the  poetry  of  the  chase  and  of  field  sports  as  thousands 
of  inarticulate  sportsmen  feel  it,  but  not  many  poets, 
undoubtedly  to  their  great  loss. 

All  this  country  to  the  banks  of  the  Avon  was  once 
covered  by  the  forest  of  the  Arden,  which  was  not, 
however,  a  forest  in  the  legal  or  Crown  sense  of  the  word. 
South  of  the  Avon,  that  part  of  Warwickshire  spread- 
ing towards  Edgehill  and  the  Cotswolds,  and  to  my 
thinking  its  most  delectable  portion,  was  a  notable 
grain  country  and  for  the  period  thickly  populated, 
though  it  is  well  to  remember  that  these  various 
granaries  of  England  produced  crops  of  about  one- 
fifth  of  the  normal  yield  of  to-day,  and  such  as  the 
most  unambitious  of  modern  farmers  would  plough 
under  without  hesitation.  However  that  may  be, 
when  the  forest  of  Arden,  like  those  of  Wyre  and 
Feckenham,  was  cut  down  for  smelting  the  iron  ore 
that  lay  to  the  north  of  it,  the  virgin  soil  was  ploughed 
up  and  seeded  to  wheat  and  grew  such  crops  that 
the  men  of  the  Feldon  across  the  Avon,  whose  lands 
had  been  cropped  since  early  Saxon  times  and 
probably  long  before,  felt  the  competition  so  severely, 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  229 

that  they  gradually  set  their  lands  to  grass  and  thus 
caused  their  population  to  melt  away.  So  at  least 
the  local  historians  tell  us,  and  the  situation  is  sug- 
gestively modern.  It  sounds  like  the  result  of  the 
Manitoba  prairies  on  the  farms  of  old  Canada,  whose 
owners  laid  down  their  lands  for  precisely  the  same 
reason  ;  but  the  population  in  this  case,  instead  of 
melting  away,  applied  themselves  to  dairying  and 
small  products,  an  opening  not  available  to  the  un- 
fortunate men  of  the  Feldon  in  the  Middle  Ages. 

In  the  triangle  roughly  defined  by  lines  drawn  from 
Stratford  to  Henley  and  from  Henley  to  Alcester  and 
Bidford,  with  the  Avon  as  a  base,  one  might  well  find 
ample  material  for  an  archaeological  magazine.     It  is 
also  a  country  that,  as  I  have  said  before,  may  be 
honestly  recommended  to  our  American  visitors  as  a 
good  average  sample  of  that  aspect  of  England,  the 
combed  and  the  groomed,  which  most  naturally  appeals 
to  most  of  them,  particularly  during  their  impressionist 
period,  which  is  unfortunately  the  whole  period  of 
too  many.     Since  they  come  to  Stratford  in  any  case 
as  pilgrims  at  another  shrine  but  Nature's,  and  so  often 
combine  with  this  homage  almost  their  only  peep  at 
English    rural    landscape  —  for    the    twenty-five-mile 
London  radius  is  not  real  country — it  is  on  the  whole 
well.     But  for  an  Englishman,  not  confined  all  his 
days  in  a  town  when  those  particular  emotions  are 
kindled  by  anything  fresh  and  green,  the  Warwick- 
shire country  north  of  the  Avon  and  Stratford  is  not 
exhilarating.     It  would  be  affectation  to  pretend  that 
it  is.     It  may  be  to  a  native,  that  is  to  such  as  have 
any  sense  of  these  things  at  all,  which  is  quite  right, 
but  his  point  of  view  is  altogether  different,  and  quite 
useless  for  other  people.     I  have  been  all  over  this 
country,  a  good  deal  of  it  several  times,  and  have  many 


2  30  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

pleasant  memories,  though  somewhat  blurred  ones,  per- 
haps, of  shady  highways,  of  old  barns,  of  homesteads, 
of  cottages,  of  thickets,  of  wild  flowers.     But  to  discourse 
upon  it  to  any  purpose  would   most    likely  alienate 
most  readers  of  discretion  who  are  not  likely  to  tolerate 
a  catalogue  of  churches  or  an  inventory  of  country- 
house  interiors  in  a  book  that  is  meant  for  the  chair, 
and  this  is  not  a  guide-book.     There  is  little  history 
of  the  kind  to  stir  one's  blood  as  an  alien,  nor  such  an 
environment  as  makes  small  things  seem  memorable. 
There  are  fine  distant  views  from  many  high  points, 
but  they  are  mostly  views  of  the  country  we  have  left 
behind  us,  of  the  vale  of  Evesham,  of  Bredon  Hill,  or 
of  the  Cotswold.     Happily  our  business  here  is  with 
the  Avon,  and  if  betimes  some  wider  flight  invites  us, 
it  is  stimulated  by  fancy  or  discretion,  not  by  obligation. 
Coughton,  an  old  house  of  the  Throgmorton  family, 
just    north  of   Alcester,  has  a    flavour    of    romance, 
having  been  occupied  by  the  wealthy  young  Everard 
Digby  of  Norfolk,  one  of  the  conspirators  in  the  Gun- 
powder Plot,  for  the  few  days  preceding  the  fatal  fifth. 
The  two  priests,  Fathers  Greenway  and  Garnet,  and 
some  Catholic  ladies,  but  half  in  the  dread  secret,  waited 
at  Coughton  for  the  result  and  were  brought  the  news 
of  its  failure  by  Catesby's  servant.  Bates.     Wilmecote, 
too,  where  the  home  of  Mary  Arden,  Shakespeare's 
mother,  is  still  standing,   lies  between  Alcester  and 
Stratford.     Turning  off  the  high  road  at  Kinwarton 
Station,    near    Coughton,   one    August    morning,   the 
memory  of  many  pleasant  tortuous  ways  through  a 
sequestered  country,  as   I   groped   my   way   through 
twisting   lanes    to   Wilmecote,    comes    vividly    back. 
The  little  Alne,  too,  is  really  at  times  a  purling  stream, 
and  where  I  encountered  it  at  one  spot  emerging  from 
a  grove  and  falling  over  the  dam  of  a  disused  sequestered 


EVESHAM  TO  STRATFORD  231 

mill,  the  effect  was  admirable.  Walcot,  again,  is  a 
hamlet  that  stays  in  my  mind  for  its  delightful  old- 
world  timbered  cottages  set  at  odd  angles  and  em- 
bellished by  the  gayest  of  little  gardens,  all  clustering 
upon  a  by-road,  where  it  climbs  out  of  a  deep  dell 
under  an  avenue  of  immense  elms.  Wilmecote,  a 
somewhat  ordinary  village,  has  few  attractions  but 
the  surpassing  one  of  the  old  farmhouse  in  which 
dwelt  the  yeoman  father  of  Mary  Arden.  It  is  a  modest 
buildmg  of  some  seven  or  eight  rooms  and  dormer 
windows  in  the  roof,  standing  just  back  from  the  road 
behind  a  garden  strip,  and  is  still  a  farmhouse,  as 
in  the  time  of  the  Ardens,  with  ancient  and  roomy 
buildings  in  the  rear.  When  I  visited  it,  they  were 
all  busy  threshing  in  the  stackyard,  which  so  obviously 
accounted  for  the  lack  of  response  to  my  knocks  at  the 
wide-open  door,  I  took  the  liberty  of  walking  through 
the  low  passage,  with  a  passing  glance  at  the  living 
rooms,  which  no  doubt  have  been  altered  since  those 
occupants  used  them  who  give  the  little  house  such 
significance  for  us  to-day.  The  old  oak  beams,  how- 
ever, are  still  in  situ,  and  the  general  appearance  of 
the  place  is  such  as  one  would  expect  and  wish  for. 

As  you  approach  Stratford  by  the  main  Evesham 
road,  above  the  north  bank  of  the  river,  it  bursts  on 
the  sight  from  the  top  of  Bardon  Hill,  the  last  and 
highest  of  many  ascents,  to  singular  advantage.  The 
prospect  five  miles  back  upon  the  same  highway 
looking  west  from  the  hill  above  Bidford,  already 
alluded  to,  has  a  western  and  Border  flavour ;  you 
there  see  big  hills  looming  in  the  near  distance, 
such  as  Bredon,  Cleeve,  and  the  Malverns.  Looking 
eastward  from  here,  however,  over  a  fairly  wide 
prospect,  you  feel  at  once  that  you  are  looking  into 
the  Midlands.     Stratford  with  its,  perhaps  from  this 


232  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

point,  too  strong  flavour  of  red  brick,  lies  compactly 
in  a  basin  rather  than  a  valley,  but  the  beautiful  spire 
of  the  church,  the  Shakespeare  Memorial,  and  other 
notable  buildings  strike  a  sufficiently  dominant  note 
to  remind  you,  if  such  were  needed,  that  you  are  look- 
ing down  on  no  ordinary  market  town.  Eight  miles 
away  on  the  right  the  long  ridge  of  Edgehill  shoots 
eastward  from  the  Cotswolds,  and  you  can  mark  the 
course  of  the  Stour,  which  just  below  joins  the  Avon 
from  the  south,  if  you  know  your  bearings,  as  far 
as  Shipstone,  Right  ahead,  too,  you  can  follow  the 
course  of  the  Avon  winding  beneath  towards  Stratford 
not  so  much  by  the  glimpse  here  and  there  afforded 
of  its  waters,  but  more  consistently  by  the  fringing 
willows  that  mark  its  winding  way  through  verdant 
meadows. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON 

IF  any  little  town  in  England  could  be  called 
self-conscious  it  is  surely  Stratford-on-Avon. 
There  is  no  other  in  any  way  occupying  the  quite 
peculiar  position  that  Stratford  has  occupied  in  the 
public  eye  upon  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  with  in- 
creasing prominence  for  half  a  century.  If  it  were 
not  for  the  author  of  its  glory  the  name  of  Stratford 
would  in  all  probability  mean  just  as  little  or  just  as 
much  to  the  ear  of  a  person  in  Hampshire  or  Yorkshire 
to-day  as  Alcester  or  Henley-in-Arden  does.  I  think, 
moreover,  one  would  have  it  so.  It  is  a  most  com- 
plete and  felicitous  example  of  the  little  agricultural 
country  town  with  its  roots  in  the  past,  and,  save 
for  the  signs  of  Shakespeare  worship,  as  slightly  un- 
affected by  modern  changes  and  adventitious  influences 
as  any  such  place  could  well  be.  The  smirching 
industries  of  the  Midlands  have  not  come  near  it,  for 
Coventry  and  Redditch  are  as  yet  well  out  of  reach. 
Its  immediate  neighbourhood  is  purely  agricultural 
and  pastoral,  and  so  far  as  any  part  of  England, 
being  the  most  beautiful  country  in  the  world,  can  be 
described  as  commonplace,  this  may  without  offence 
be  fairly  called  so. 

Nor  is  there  any  paradox  in  the  suggestion  that  so 
much  the  more  does  its  atmosphere  seem  in  harmony 
with   England's   greatest   genius.     Though    one   may 


234  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

one's  selfjprefer  the  slopes  of  Dartmoor,  the  foot  of  the 
Malverns,  or  the  Wye  valley,  one  feels  that  this  fat 
heart  of  England  is  the  very  setting  one  would  ask 
for  the  personality  of  Shakespeare,  and  is  altogether 
more  appropriate  than  an  atmosphere  of  exalted 
natural  beauty,  such  as  we  are  happy  in  associating 
with  some  merely  great  singer.  It  is  a  mere  common- 
place that  a  typical  bit  of  rural  England  like  this 
corner  of  Warwickshire,  above  all  at  such  a  period,  is 
the  best  background  for  Shakespeare,  and  one  can  hardly 
think  that  enthusiasts  do  the  situation  much  service 
by  idealizing  the  homely  scenes  which  they  exploit  so 
indefatigably  for  traces  either  of  his  youthful  indis- 
cretions or  that  profoundly  respectable  middle  age 
which  he  was  permitted  to  enjoy  in  his  native  town. 
One  almost  hesitates  to  tread  on  ground  that  has 
been  covered  and  re-covered  by  so  many  pens  in 
such  a  mass  of  literature.  But  the  ordinary  pilgrim 
in  possession  of  only  such  facts  and  theories  of  Shake- 
speare's connection  with  his  native  town  as  are 
within  every  one's  ready  reach  must  feel  the  sig- 
nificance of  these  two  periods  of  his  life.  If  Shake- 
speare's association  with  the  place  had  been  limited 
merely  to  his  birth  and  youth,  and  had  he  then  wandered 
away  for  ever,  after  the  more  common  fashion  of  great 
men,  Stratford  would  still  be  famous.  But  the 
"  return  of  the  native  "  to  a  yet  more  intimate  con- 
nection with  his  old  home  in  middle  life,  and  his 
honours  thick  upon  him,  and,  so  far  as  we  may  judge, 
an  honest  pride  in  becoming  a  leading  burgher  and 
owner  in  his  own  obscure  town  is  unique.  It  gives 
Stratford  far  more  than  the  interest  of  a  mere  birth- 
place and  nursing  mother,  and  amply  justifies  the 
character  of  a  national  shrine  into  which  the  little 
town  has  in  the  last  half-century  been  more  and  more 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  235 

exalted.  Probably  in  the  early  seventeenth  century 
the  call  of  a  mountain  valley  would  in  no  case  have 
been  so  insistent  to  a  wandering  son  who  had  won  fame 
and  name  as  in  the  nineteenth.  But,  nevertheless, 
that  the  typical  ordinary  English  country-side  should 
have  had  this  magnetic  power  over  so  illustrious  a 
one  makes  surely  for  the  greater  fascination  in  the 
Shakespearean  associations  of  Stratford.  Certainly  to 
me  it  seems  so — and  if  one  may  venture  with  due 
humility  to  record  a  mere  personal  fancy,  the  return  of 
the  poet,  his  residence,  and  his  death  at  Stratford 
seem  almost  a  greater  glory  to  the  place  than  his  birth. 
Certainly  Stratford  is  unique.  On  a  damp  after- 
noon in  November,  but  for  a  few  significant  placards 
in  its  somewhat  suspiciously  smart  shop  windows,  you 
might  follow  down  its  ancient  High  Street  involved 
perhaps  in  the  intricacies  of  a  travelling  flock  of  sheep, 
and  swear  that  the  little  town  lived  and  moved  and 
had  its  sole  being  in  the  price  of  wheat  and  stock. 
Take  a  bright  summer  day,  on  the  other  hand,  and 
the  mark  of  the  outer  world  is  all  over  it.  You 
will  jostle  at  every  turn  not  only  the  natives  of  all 
countries  that  speak  Shakespeare's  tongue,  but  of 
many  that  do  not.  This  would,  of  course,  be  unnotice- 
able  in  Piccadilly  or  even  on  the  High  at  Oxford,  but 
to  the  contemplative  soul  not  in  a  hurry,  with  a  good 
many  score  of  little  English  country  towns  more  or  less 
like  this  one  in  the  mind,  the  spectacle  is  a  singular 
one.  Stratford  has  a  moderate  showing  of  genuine 
old  houses,  but  does  not  profess  to  be  upon  the  same 
plane  in  this  respect  as  Tewkesbury.  And  as  my 
concern  in  this  book  is  with  Shakespeare's  Avon,  and 
not  directly  with  the  poet's  native  town,  and  his 
conjectured  haunts  around  it,  I  should  like  again  to 
urge  our  visitors  from  across  the  seas  to  remember 


236  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

that  there  are  three  towns  upon  the  Avon  below 
Stratford,  to  say  nothing  of  some  villages,  among 
the  best  in  England,  well  worthy  of  their  attention. 
And  for  such  pilgrims  as  have  leisure  for  something 
more  than  the  conventional  tribute  at  the  Stratford 
altar,  and  also  an  eye  to  the  rural  beauties  of  England 
and  any  curiosity  at  all  concerning  its  landscape,  I 
would  make  free  to  remind  them  that  these  beauties 
wax  steadily  with  the  river's  downward  flow.  Some 
Shakespeare  pilgrims  are  in  a  portentous  hurry.  On 
a  recent  visit  to  the  beautiful  church,  wherein  lies 
the  poet's  dust,  and  which  forms,  in  connection  with 
the  river  gliding  by  it,  Stratford's  greatest  ornament, 
I  was  privileged  to  witness  one  of  those  performances 
that  we  sometimes  read  of  with  more  than  half  a 
notion  that  they  belong  rather  to  the  humorous 
than  the  serious  side  of  journalism.  I  was  lingering 
on  this  occasion  in  the  north  porch,  the  place  of 
public  entry,  talking  to  the  custodian,  when  a  young 
couple,  male  and  female,  brushed  past  us  and  sped 
down  the  avenue  of  limes,  which  so  picturesquely 
divides  the  churchyard  to  the  gate,  with  a  celerity  that 
of  itself  would  have  called  for  no  remark  in  a  place 
where  people  were  in  a  chronic  state  of  catching 
trams.  But  my  friend  the  custodian,  who  must  see 
and  hear  many  precious  things  in  the  course  of  his 
daily  round,  called  my  attention  to  the  Americans, 
for  such  they  were,  as  something  a  little  outside 
even  his  experiences.  It  appears  that  in  their 
urgency,  while  demanding  the  ticket  at  the  door 
which  makes  visitors  free  of  the  chancel  and  Shake- 
speare's grave  and  bust,  the  confession  had  escaped 
them  that  they  were  engaged  in  a  competition  for 
some  sort  of  wager,  either  against  time  or  some  other 
egregious  pair  or  pairs  of  Philistines,  to  take  in  as 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  237 

many  European  sights  as  could  be  compassed  within 
a  given  time.  Stratford,  which  in  itself  would  be  a 
stiff  item  in  such  a  programme,  was  part  of  this  amaz- 
ing record,  and  I  was  given  to  understand  that  the 
dispatch  with  which  they  made  the  trip  up  the  aisle 
to  the  grave  and  back  was  barely  within  the  bounds 
of  decorum. 

Almost  every  one  in  person  or  through  illustration 
knows  the  appearance  of  Shakespeare's  church,  as 
seen  from  the  nearer  bridge,  lifting  its  tall,  tapering 
spire  with  such  distinction  above  its  leafy  precincts 
on  the  banks  of  the  Avon,  which  here  as  at  Evesham 
has  been  artificially  widened  to  the  great  artistic 
advantage  of  the  old  town  whose  bounds  it  washes. 
Edging  the  churchyard  and  overhanging  the  placid 
river  is  a  fringe  of  stately  rook-haunted  elms,  and  in 
the  centre  of  the  same  level,  beautifully  kept  graveyard, 
quite  clear  of  the  town  at  its  southern  extremity,  is 
planted  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Trinity.  It  is  a  happy 
circumstance  that  a  parish  church,  so  much  more 
imposing  and  generally  inspiring  than  one  might 
perhaps  look  for  in  such  a  place  as  Stratford,  should 
cover  the  dust  of  Shakespeare  and  form  such  a  noble 
as  well  as  a  genuine  feature  in  the  Stratford  landscape. 
And  though  not  the  whole  or  part  of  a  mighty  abbey 
fane,  such  as  remains  to  the  three  towns  lower  down 
the  river,  this  one,  even  apart  from  its  situation  and 
associations,  is  a  really  fine  specimen  of  a  collegiate 
church.  For  such  it  was  before  the  Reformation, 
happy  in  the  possession  of  a  dean,  a  chapter,  and  a 
brotherhood  of  priests. 

Stratford  Church  consists  of  a  nave  over  100  feet 
long  with  north  and  south  aisles,  a  north  porch, 
transepts,  chancel,  and  a  central  tower  with  battle- 
ments and  corner  turrets  carrying  an  eighteenth  century 


238  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARF/S  COUNTRY 

spire,  83  feet  in  height.  Though  some  earher  Norman 
work  is  embodied  in  the  tower  and  elsewhere,  practi- 
cally none  is  visible.  Otherwise  the  transepts,  tower, 
and  north  aisle,  all  of  Early  English  date,  though  a  good 
deal  altered  from  the  original,  comprise  the  oldest 
part  of  the  building,  which  on  entering  displays  a 
fine,  spacious,  and  handsome  interior  richly  decorated. 
The  nave  is  thirteenth  century,  with  a  good  panelled 
oak  roof  supportd  by  an  arcade  of  decorated  arches 
springing  from  hexagonal  piers.  The  clerestory  was 
pulled  down  in  the  fifteenth  century  and  rebuilt  as  we 
now  see  it  with  a  row  of  large  lantern  windows  almost 
touching  one  another.  The  south  aisle  is  of  the  early 
fourteenth  century,  and  like  the  north  aisle  is  lit 
by  four  three-light  windows.  The  north  porch,  the 
principal  entrance,  is  fifteenth  century  embattled  and 
containing  a  parvise.  The  chancel,  a  fine  example  of 
Perpendicular  work,  was  rebuilt  about  the  end  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  while  the  choir  stalls  are  mainly 
original  and  fashioned  of  massive  oak,  with  quaintly 
carved  miserere  seats. 

Just  within  the  altar  rails  are  a  number  of  flat  stones 
indicating  the  Shakespeare  graves.  The  one  nearest 
the  north  wall  is  that  of  Anne  Shakespeare,  wife  of 
the  poet.  The  next  one  covers  the  remains  of  Shake- 
speare himself,  with  the  well-known  lines  cursing  any  one 
who  ventures  to  interfere  with  his  bones — no  superfluous 
precaution  in  those  days  when  remains  that  came  in 
the  way  of  later  interments  were  treated  with  such 
scant  reverence.  Indeed,  on  more  than  one  occasion, 
attempts  were  actually  made  to  steal  those  of  the 
poet  himself.  To  the  south  of  these  are  the  grave- 
stones of  Thomas  Nash,  husband  of  the  poet's 
granddaughter,  of  Dr.  John  Hall  who  married 
Shakespeare's  favourite  daughter,  Susanna,  and  lastly 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  2  39 

those    of    that    lady  herself  who   died    a    widow   in 
1649. 

Witty  above  her  sexe,  but  that's  not  all; 
Wise  to  Salvation  was  good  Mistress  Hall. 
Something  of  Shakespeare  was  in  that,  but  this. 
Wholly  of  him,  with  whom  she's  now  in  blisse. 

Then,  again,  at  some  height  up,  on  the  north  wall, 
is  the  famous  bust  of  the  poet,  fashioned  in  the  year 
1623,  about  which  so  many  hard  things  are  said.  As 
Shakespeare's  family  were  all  alive  when  it  was  executed 
there  must  be  some  sort  of  likeness  to  the  original, 
whatever  its  merits  as  a  work  of  art.  It  is  thought  to 
have  been  taken  from  a  mask  after  death,  and  any 
clue  which  helps  us  to  realize  what  the  man  was  like 
is  very  much  more  important  than  the  abstract 
quality  of  the  sculptor's  performance.  The  mere 
colouring  alone,  the  blue  eyes  and  auburn  hair  and 
beard,  though  repainted,  is  valuable.  On  the  east  wall 
of  the  chancel  and  on  the  north  side  of  the  altar, 
beneath  an  arch  supported  by  Corinthian  columns,  lies 
the  effigy  of  John  Combe,  the  friend  and  contemporary 
of  Shakespeare,  dressed  in  a  gown  and  holding  a  book. 
He  lived  in  the  college,  the  former  residence  of  the 
clergy,  was  conspicuous  for  his  charities,  and  died  in 
1614.  Next  to  Shakespeare  on  the  same  wall  are  two 
white  marble  busts  of  John  Combe's  son  Richard  and 
his  intended  wife  Judith.  Nor  should  one  overlook 
a  small  brass  close  to  the  poet's  bust  in  memory  of 
Halliwell  Phillipps,  the  well-known  and  voluminous 
writer  on  Shakespeare. 

It  is  here,  of  course,  at  these  cold  stones  covering 
the  dust  of  Shakespeare  and  his  relatives  that  the 
interest  of  visitors  largely  centres.  It  is  worth  re- 
membering, too,  that  the  Shakespeare  family  had  this 


240  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

right  of  burial  within  the  chancel  rails,  since  the  poet 
had  purchased  the  great  tithes. 

There  are  far  finer  monuments  in  the  church  than 
any  of  these,  mostly  at  the  end  of  the  north  aisle, 
recumbent  alabaster  figures  of  the  Cloptons,  and  the 
Carews,  Earls  of  Totnes,  both  their  men  and  women, 
and  also  one  of  Sir  Edward  Walker,  who  purchased 
New  Place,  Shakespeare's  house,  from  the  Halls,  and 
who  helped  Lord  Clarendon  with  his  great  history  of 
the  Rebellion.  I  was  seated  in  contemplation  of  these 
in  the  north  aisle — in  the  Clopton  chapel  in  fact — on 
one  occasion  where  also  was  a  quiet -looking  little  lady 
who  proved  to  be  an  American,  surveying  them  long 
and  steadfastly  in  the  intervals  of  most  obviously 
despairing  references  to  a  chart  of  the  church  and  its 
monuments.  We  may  each  have  sat  there  perhaps 
for  five  minutes,  when  at  last  in  a  gentle  voice,  patheti- 
cally suggestive  of  her  topographical  struggles,  she 
exclaimed,  "  Can  you  tell  me,  sir,  which  is  Shakespeare 
of  all  those  figures  ?  "  Most  certainly  she  was  not  an 
Episcopalian,  and  to  the  other  Protestant  creeds, 
whose  churches  I  take  it  have  no  particular  points  of 
the  compass  and  certainly  few  intricacies,  and  to  whose 
average  disciples,  I  presume,  transepts,  choirs,  pres- 
byteries, north  aisles,  and  south  aisles  are  almost 
enigmatic  terms,  the  directions  of  the  guide-book 
through  the  mazes  of  a  great  church  or  a  cathedral 
must  surely  prove  a  quite  formidable  mental  strain. 

There  are  visitors'  books,  of  course,  near  the  door 
of  the  church,  one  especially  devoted  to  Americans, 
who  as  a  people  have  done  so  much  for  Stratford  and 
enjoy  themselves  there  so  much  more  than  English 
pilgrims.  And  so  they  should,  for  many  of  them  are 
not  merely  paying  their  respects  to  Shakespeare,  but 
are  seeing  a  bit  of  provincial  England  for  the  first 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  241 

time.  The  ordinary  American  travellers,  too,  are  less 
critical,  more  ready  abroad,  as  at  home,  to  take  the 
romance  of  the  past  in  all  its  details  for  granted  and 
without  question,  and,  unless  used  to  it,  somewhat  over- 
awed by  the  weight  of  years  that  gazes  at  them  from 
every  quarter  in  Old  England.  For  this  freshness  they 
may  be  envied.  I  have  no  patience  with  the  Briton 
who  assumes  an  air  of  amused  surprise  at  this  particular 
form  of  transatlantic  ardour,  whether  expressed  in  the 
undeniably  strident  note  of  Chicago  or  in  the  cultured 
tones  of  Boston.  The  English  tourist  is  sceptical  of 
tradition  and  quite  as  often  pretends  to  be.  It  is 
difficult  to  picture  those  great  droves  of  one's  mediaeval 
forbears  and  their  womenfolk  on  long  laborious 
journeys  to  lay  their  offerings  upon  the  shrine  of 
Thomas  a  Becket  or  of  any  one  other  saint.  It 
would  be  more  pertinent  to  say  that  it  is  hard  to  realize 
what  a  change  the  Reformation  and  the  subsequent 
Puritan  movement  made  in  the  English  character. 

Old  Stratford  is  skirted  by  quite  a  thick  margin  of 
roads  and  avenues  of  red  brick  villas,  not  aesthetically 
offensive,  but  just  the  ordinary  residential  quarter 
that  springs  up  around  country  towns  now  that 
tradesmen  no  longer  live  over  their  shops,  but,  like 
the  professional  and  wholesale  trading  element,  grow 
roses  or  play  tennis  upon  their  own  half  acre  in  a 
suburb.  But  old  Stratford  alone  concerns  us  here, 
and  the  main  street,  which,  under  different  names,  is 
of  a  considerable  length,  contains  the  chief  objects  of 
interest  that  are  not  modern,  always  excepting  the 
Birthplace,  which  stands  in  Henley  Street,  an  artery 
crossing  the  eastern  limit  of  the  other  and  continu- 
ing down  the  broad  space  of  Bridge  Street  to  the 
river.  It  seems  almost  banal  to  expend  a  few  lines 
on  a  building,  every  stone  and  beam  and  window  of 
16 


242  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

which  has  been  the  text  of  many  pamphlets  as  well 
as  the  bone  of  many  controversies.  But  it  is  singu- 
larly felicitous  that  two  half-timbered  houses  of  mid- 
sixteenth  century  date,  knocked  into  one  and  that 
certainly  belonged  to  Shakespeare's  father,  should 
have  survived  long  enough  to  emerge  into  the  secure 
harbourage  of  the  Shakespeare  Revival.  What  pre- 
cise restoration  this  ancient  building,  abutting  on 
the  street  with  its  dormer  windows,  has  undergone 
may  be  read  in  many  local  hand-books.  It  is  enough 
here  that  Shakespeare's  father,  a  yeoman,  became 
prosperous  by  successful  trading,  was  able  to  buy 
first  one  and  later  on  the  other  of  these  two  adjoining 
houses,  and  became  mayor  or  high  bailiff  of  the 
little  town  that  had  only  recently  been  incorporated 
and  promoted  to  such  civic  honours.  That  John 
Shakespeare  fell  later  into  difficulties,  and  so  brought 
his  name  more  than  once  upon  the  town  records, 
adds  at  any  rate  to  the  slender  stock  of  the  family 
history  that  is  preserved  for  us. 

The  two  united  houses,  the  one  in  which  the  poet's 
father  lived  and  in  which  he  himself  was  born,  now 
known  as  the  Birthplace,  and  the  other  historically 
designated  the  "Woolshop",  from  the  fact  of  John 
Shakespeare  having  used  it  for  that  purpose,  passed 
through  the  ownership  of  William  to  that  of  his 
sister  and  daughters  Joan  Hart  and  Susanna  Hall. 
The  latter,  who  became  eventually  the  sole  owner,  left 
it  to  her  daughter  Lady  Barnard,  who,  dying  childless, 
left  it  back  to  the  Harts,  and  for  over  a  century  these 
descendants  of  Shakespeare's  sister,  retail  tradesmen, 
butchers,  furriers,  tailors,  and  the  like,  owned  and 
apparently  occupied  it.  Through  them  the  house 
retained  its  connection  with  the  Shakespeare  family 
as  late  as  1806,  when  the  poverty  of  the  children  of 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  243 

Thomas  Hart  after  his  death  forced  a  sale,  and  their 
connection  with  Stratford  was  finally  severed.  The 
last  of  these  collateral  descendants  of  Shakespeare 
emigrated  to  Australia  about  the  year  1864. 

I  had  not  intended  even  a  summary  of  Shake- 
speare's genealogy,  as  it  all  belongs  to  that  immense 
subject  into  which  it  would  be  both  superfluous  and 
perilous  for  one  professing  no  particular  equipment 
to  enter.  I  certainly  do  not  propose  to  take  my 
reader,  with  the  inevitable  and  unavoidable  swarm 
of  visitors  that  also  pay  their  shilling,  through  the 
Birthplace,  to  catalogue  the  interesting  contents  of 
the  museum  therein  contained,  or  to  gaze  upon 
the  rude  and  obviously  genuine  attic  wherein  tra- 
dition says  that  the  immortal  bard  was  born. 

With  regard  to  the  Birthplace,  with  a  big  B,  it  always 
seems  to  me  that  the  spot  in  which  the  cradle  of  a 
great  man  was  rocked  is  absolutely  the  least  interest- 
ing of  all  the  scenes  with  which  he  was  intimately 
associated.  By  comparison,  for  instance,  with  Rj^dal 
Mount  and  Dove  Cottage,  what  person  of  discretion 
greatly  cares  to  see  the  house  in  Cockermouth  in 
which  Wordsworth  was  born  ?  Shakespeare,  the  man, 
however,  is  so  distractingly  elusive,  that  one  is  thankful 
for  very  little.  Possibly,  too,  he  went  to  live  with 
his  father  at  the  Birthplace  after  his  early  marriage 
to  Ann  Hathaway.  But  if  New  Place,  which  the 
poet  made  his  home  on  his  return  to  Stratford,  and 
within  which  he  died,  were  still  standing,  that  would 
be  indeed  a  hearth  to  linger  by. 

It  is  now  many  years  since  a  most  entertaining 
short  story,  entitled  "  The  Birthplace  ",  came  from  the 
pen  of  Mr.  Henry  James.  It  describes  the  experiences 
and  emotions  of  an  educated  couple  in  reduced 
circumstances  who  accept  the  position  of  custodians 


244  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

at  the  much  visited  shrine  of  a  great  man.  They 
piously  cultivated,  before  entering  into  possession,  an 
awesome  sense  of  the  importance  of  their  impending 
duties,  and  revelled  in  the  altruistic  fashion  in  which 
they  looked  forward  to  performing  them.  They  spoke 
to  one  another  of  the  great  dead  whose  ancient  haunts 
they  were  to  inhabit  and  illuminate  for  a  touring 
world,  hitherto  accustomed  only  to  the  perfunctory 
bleating  of  some  unlettered  custodian,  as  Him,  utter- 
ing the  word  with  reverentially  bated  breath.  The 
Him  in  this  case  might  be  Shakespeare  himself  but 
for  the  wholly  serious  and  official  manner  in  which  the 
facts  and  theories  regarding  his  life  are  distinguished, 
and  so  to  speak  edited  for  the  highly  superior  officials 
who  proclaim  them  at  intervals.  In  this  other 
case  there  was  no  such  supervision,  and  the  illiterate 
guardians  of  the  Manes  had  hitherto  indulged  them- 
selves and  the  pilgrims  with  much  picturesque 
biography  that  had  no  foundation  in  fact.  The 
dreamy  scholar  and  his  wife,  of  Mr.  James's  creation, 
were  going  to  change  all  that  and  treat  the  business 
on  a  higher  plane,  worthy  of  its  great  subject. 

The  public  on  neither  side  of  the  Atlantic  appreci- 
ated this  scholarly  and  conscientious  treatment ;  such 
refinement  of  enthusiasm  appealed  to  them  not  at  all. 
Receipts  fall  off ;  the  committee  talk  ominously ; 
dismissal  and  ruin  appear  to  threaten  the  hapless 
pair.  I  think  it  is  the  wife,  the  more  practical  partner 
of  course,  who  first  recognizes  the  urgent  need  for  a 
change  of  method,  which  they  shamefacedly  and  for 
bread-sake  alone  proceed  to  carry  out,  with  such 
amazing  thoroughness  that  the  fame  of  their  pictur- 
esque and  thrilling  discourse  reaches  to  the  farthest 
bounds  of  the  United  States.  People  come  tumbling 
over  one  another  as  never  before  to  see  the  Birthplace, 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  245 

and  listen  to  its  stirring  tale  with  a  correspondingly 
gratifying  result  to  the  balance-sheet  and  the  demeanour 
of  the  trustees.  One  day  a  scholarly  visitor  who 
had  respected  and  appreciated  the  enthusiasm  and 
altruistic  attitude  of  the  poor  but  cultured  custodian 
on  a  previous  visit,  now  paid  another,  and,  unrecognized 
or  unseen,  listened  with  amazement  to  the  highly 
coloured  rhetoric  of  his  former  hypercritical  and 
fastidious  cicerone.  It  brought  about  a  further 
interview  in  which  this  abashed  and  shamefaced 
breadwinner  confessed  all  and  was  rescued  for  better 
things  and  a  better  job  by  the  influential  stranger. 

Heaven  forbid  that  I  should  breathe  a  word  against 
the  honest  men  who  do  their  arduous  duty  in  such 
positions,  lay  or  ecclesiastical.  On  the  contrary,  and 
I  can  speak  at  any  rate  with  a  fairly  wide  experience, 
it  is  surprising  to  me  how  many  one  finds  possessed 
of  true  enthusiasm  that  the  deadening  daily  round 
cannot  kill.  Give  such  a  man  the  opportunity  when 
the  gate  is  locked  and  the  crowd  have  gone,  and  he  will 
warm  to  the  subject  in  altogether  another  fashion  and 
with  unmistakable  and  genuine  enjoyment  and  no  little 
knowledge.  You  would  fancy,  too,  that  an  individ- 
ual who  spent  his  days  in  taking  well-meaning  but 
mostly  ill-equipped  groups  of  visitors  round  a  cathedral, 
would  rush  away  on  his  fortnight's  holiday  to  some 
far  -  away  and  seemingly  blessed  spot  beyond  the 
reach  of  church  bells,  or  chanting  choirs,  or  intoning 
minor  canons.  But  I  have  met  quite  a  number  who 
spend  their  brief  vacations  in  study  of  other  abbeys, 
or  other  cathedrals,  or  other  castles.  I  don't  know 
where  the  custodians  of  the  treasures  of  Stratford-on- 
Avon  spend  their  holidays,  but  they  are  the  most 
effective  and  conscientious  set  of  wights. 

The  Birthplace  is  a  good  specimen  of  a  sixteenth 


246  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARF/S  COUNTRY 

century  house,  and  as  the  only  interior  of  that  date 
which  thousands  from  the  new  countries  ever  see  in 
their  Hves,  has  of  course  a  quite  unique  importance. 
In  the  main  street  of  the  town  there  are  several  old 
houses  which  we  need  not  catalogue,  having  come 
from  Tewkesbury  ;  a  particularly  noticeable  one,  how- 
ever, is  a  half-timbered,  overhanging  building  of  five 
gables  with  shops  underneath,  next  to  the  "Shakespeare 
Hotel ".  But  the  grammar  school  where  Shake- 
speare, according  to  tradition,  was  educated,  and  ac- 
cording to  the  good  old  Wiltshire  gossip  and  antiquary, 
John  Aubrey,  was  a  teacher  for  a  brief  time,  together 
with  the  guild-chapel  and  guild-hall  all  connected, 
make  an  exceedingly  striking  group  in  that  southerly 
extension  of  the  High  Street  known  as  Church  Street. 
Now  there  is  one  thing  that  distinguishes  Stratford 
above  other  towns  of  its  class.  Its  records  are  extra- 
ordinarily full  and  complete,  and  this  is  curiousl}'- 
appropriate,  if  only  they  told  us  a  little  more  about 
the  only  person  of  supreme  importance  with  which 
the  town  has  ever  been  concerned.  So  the  guild-hall, 
a  fine  old  room,  probably  rebuilt  in  1417,  has  a  good 
deal  to  say  for  itself.  Some  contemporary  paintings 
of  a  sacred  character  can  just  be  traced  upon  the 
walls,  but  two  shields  bearing  the  arms  of  England 
and  those  of  Beauchamp  quartering  Despenser  are 
more  distinct.  There  are  also  some  accounts  scrawled 
upon  the  wall  of  fifteenth  century  date.  The  hall  was 
the  scene  of  great  feasting  in  pre-Tudor  times,  and 
an  existing  account  for  the  liquor  consumed  in  one 
of  these  orgies  in  the  reign  of  Henry  IV  foots  up 
to  80  gallons  of  ale,  while  among  the  solids  were 
103  pullets.  In  the  great  days  of  Ehzabeth  the  hall 
was  placed  at  the  disposal  of  travelling  companies  of 
actors,  and  it  is  on  the  records  that  John  Shakespeare, 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  247 

the  poet's  father,  doubtless  while  mayor  or  high 
baihff,  presided  at  an  entertainment  of  this  character 
in  1569.  At  the  upper  end  of  the  hall  a  door  opens 
into  the  armoury  where  is  some  good  seventeenth 
century  panelling.  Thence  a  stairway  leads  to  the 
muniment  room,  once  used  as  the  repository  of  the 
town  records.  It  has  a  fine  timber  roof,  and  on 
the  wall  two  Tudor  roses,  one  white  with  a  red  centre 
and  the  other  the  reverse,  indicating  the  union  of  the 
houses  of  Lancaster  and  York  in  the  marriage  of 
Henry  VII  with  Elizabeth  of  York.  This  is  now  the 
school  library,  and  out  of  the  room  opens  the  big 
schoolroom  itself,  formerly  two  rooms  where  Shake- 
speare supposititiously  both  acquired  and  imparted 
knowledge.  At  any  rate  it  has  been  decided  which 
was  his  desk,  for  this  last  has  now  been  deposited  in 
the  Museum  of  the  Birthplace.  Outside  upon  the 
playground  a  building,  known  by  the  curious  appella- 
tion of  the  Pedagogue's  House,  confronts  the  visitor, 
and  is  as  well  worth  his  attention  as  any  room  in  Strat- 
ford, the  beams  of  its  roof  being  of  prodigious  propor- 
tions. It  is  now  used  as  classrooms.  The  school  is 
a  very  old  foundation  and  of  pre-Reformation  origin, 
having  been  founded  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VI  by  a 
priest  of  the  town  named  Jollyffe.  Its  revenues  were 
seized  of  course  by  Henry  VIII,  but  later  on  restored 
by  Edward  VI,  from  which  time  it  seems  to  have 
fulfilled  the  ordinary  functions  of  a  local  grammar 
school.  Its  situation  in  so  small  a  town  has  no  doubt 
prevented  it  from  profiting  by  its  associations  with 
Shakespeare,  and  its  situation  as  a  show  building,  like 
so  many  others,  into  a  prominent  school.  Adjoining 
it  are  the  old  almshouses  of  the  guild  which  had  pre- 
cisely the  same  experiences  at  the  Dissolution  and  again 
at  the  more  generous  hands  of  the  youthful  Edward. 


248  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

The  old  guild-chapel  adjoining  the  grammar  school 
is  now  used  as  a  second  church.  It  fronts  upon  the 
street,  and  is  one  of  the  most  prominent  objects  in  the 
town.  Sir  Hugh  Clopton  rebuilt  it  in  the  time  of 
Henry  VII  on  the  site  of  an  old  Augustinian  chapel 
of  date  1296.  It  is  conspicuously  late  Perpendicular 
in  character,  and  its  great  windows  and  low  embattled 
tower  are  in  fine  harmony  and  leave  no  doubt  as  to 
its  character  the  moment  it  comes  in  sight.  Close  by, 
with  nothing  in  fact  but  a  by-street  between  them,  are 
the  gardens  of  New  Place  where  once  stood  the  house  in 
which  Shakespeare  lived  after  his  final  return  to  Strat- 
ford as  an  owner  of  land  and  tenements,  and  apparently 
happy  in  being  the  leading  citizen  of  his  native  town. 

There  are  some  traces  of  the  foundations  of  the  orig- 
inal house  and  also  of  its  well,  still  left  in  the  gardens, 
which  last  were  bought  by  public  subscription  some 
fifty  years  ago  and  converted  into  an  extremely 
alluring  resort  for  the  public.  The  story  of  the  vanished 
house  is  rather  curious  and  at  the  same  time  not  a  little 
distressing.  Built  originally  in  the  time  of  Henry  VII 
by  Sir  Hugh  Clopton,  of  that  well-known  local  family, 
as  "  a  pretty  house  of  brick  and  timber  ",  it  was  prob- 
ably the  most  important  in  the  town  and  was  known 
as  the  Great  House.  It  passed  from  the  hands  of 
the  Cloptons  into  those  of  a  local  lawyer  in  1563,  and 
was  eventually  purchased  by  William  Shakespeare  in 
1597  for  ;f6o,  which  is  thought  to  indicate  that  the  place 
must  have  been  in  a  state  of  dilapidation.  Shakespeare, 
at  any  rate,  repaired  it,  and  called  it  New  Place,  and 
in  the  deed  of  sale  it  is  described  as  "  one  messuage, 
two  barns,  and  two  gardens".  The  poet  was  at  this 
time  thirty-three  and  not  nearly  prepared  as  yet  to 
retire  into  private  life,  so  the  town  clerk  became  its 
for  a  time  tenant.     On  Shakespeare's  retirement  from 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  249 

London  in  1609  he  settled  here  with  his  family  and 
died  in  the  house  seven  years  later.  All  evidence 
seems  to  point  that  the  poet  had  greatly  at  heart  the 
reinstating  of  his  father  in  the  position  from  which 
misfortune  had  reduced  him.  He  appears  to  have 
already  made  several  visits  to  Stratford  with  a  view  to 
this  laudable  and  filial  ambition,  which  his  own  success 
in  life  must  have  materially  advanced.  The  modern 
may  smile  at  Shakespeare's  importuning  for  a  family 
coat  of  arms,  granted  apparently  with  some  reluctance 
to  his  father.  But  the  purchase  of  lands  and  the  tithes 
of  the  church,  together  with  New  Place,  by  the  poet, 
evidently  altered  all  this;  the  suits  which  were  in  process 
or  pending  against  John  Shakespeare, the  once  respected 
but  now  decadent  ex-mayor,  were  disposed  of  by  the 
son's  earnings,  and  all  was  well.  Though  these  years 
of  residence  are  almost  blank,  filled  in  chiefly  by  con- 
jecture and  the  conclusions  arrived  at  by  many 
zealous  and  able  investigators  from  indirect  evidence, 
Shakespeare's  own  house  would  nevertheless  be  a 
treasure  indeed,  a  much  greater  one  than  the  Birth- 
place, and  the  way  of  its  destruction  aggravates  the 
loss.  For  it  is  reasonable  to  think  that  if  it  had 
survived  for  another  generation  or  two  in  this  quiet 
old  town,  its  memorable  associations  would  have  made 
their  appeal  and  saved  it. 

In  the  course  of  time  New  Place  passed  out  of 
the  possession  of  Shakespeare's  descendants,  falhng 
again  curiously  enough  into  the  hands  of  the  Cloptons, 
who  after  over  a  century  of  ownerships  sold  it  to  a 
certain  Francis  Gastrell,  vicar  of  Frodsham  in  Cheshire. 
Tourists  of  some  sort  must  even  thus  early  have  haunted 
Stratford,  for  a  mulberry  tree  planted  by  Shakespeare 
in  1609  became  so  much  sought  after  by  visitors  that 
the  recent  and  reverend  owner  hewed  it  down  in  a 


250  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

moment  of  spleen  for  the  trouble  they  gave  him.  But 
this  was  nothing  to  the  after  performances  of  this 
preposterous  parson.  He  had  apparently  to  reside  at 
Lichfield,  perhaps  as  a  canon,  for  part  of  the  year, 
and  was  so  infuriated  at  having  to  pay  the  poor  rates 
in  Stratford  while  absent,  that  he  razed  his  house  to 
the  ground  and  so  cut  off  his  nose  to  spite  his  face, 
and  incidentally  posterity.  The  house,  it  is  true,  seems 
to  have  been  considerably  altered  by  the  later  Cloptons, 
but  nevertheless  is  thought  to  have  contained  a  great 
deal  of  the  original  building.  It  is  interesting  to  note 
that,  during  the  Civil  War,  Queen  Henrietta  Maria 
stopped  here  for  three  days,  and  that,  too,  during 
the  occupation  of  Shakespeare's  daughter,  Mrs.  Hall. 
This  is  often  cited  as  a  proof  of  the  great  respectabil- 
ity of  the  Shakespeare  family.  Of  course  they  were 
respectable  !  It  is  perfectly  clear  what  the  Halls  were, 
and  New  Place  being  one  of  the  best,  if  not  the  best, 
house  in  Stratford  would  naturally  be  selected  for 
the  Royal  lodgings.  Another  writer,  deprecating  the 
old  idea  that  Shakespeare  sprang  from  the  humblest 
sphere,  says  he  belonged  to  the  "  upper  middle  class  ". 
I  only  mention  this  as  illustrating  the  hopeless  lack 
of  knowledge  and  imagination  that  makes  so  many 
persons  of  our  generation  regard  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  century  through  the  medium  of  county 
and  country  town  society  in  1900.  I  have  said  enough 
perhaps  of  this  in  a  former  chapter,  but  imagine  talking 
of  John  Shakespeare  as  belonging  to  the  upper  middle 
class !  I  do  not  allude  to  the  proposition  but  to  the 
phrase ;  one  can  almost  feel  in  it  its  author's  limita- 
tions. Then  another  enthusiast  for  Shakespeare's 
"  gentility  "  speaks  of  the  family  as  having  originated 
in  a  person  of  territorial  consequence. 

The  clan  of  Shakespeare,  for  the  family  seems  to 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  2  5 1 

have  been  a  numerous  one  in  the  three  counties,  may 
have  originated  in  such  a  source,  but  under  the  EngUsh 
social  system  how  futile  to  quote  it  when  the  early 
tie  has  long  been  severed  and  forgotten  and  they  had 
all  scattered  as  small  farmers  or  tradesmen.  John 
Shakespeare  is  held  to  be  the  son  of  a  small  farmer 
at  Snitterfield.  He  started  as  a  glover  but  rose  to  a 
leading  position  in  Stratford,  by  character  and  ability 
no  doubt.  Again  oppressed  by  the  twentieth  century 
a  writer  comes  in  and  says  that  he  gained  something 
by  his  marriage  with  Mary  Arden,  a  "  gentleman's 
daughter  and  an  heiress  ".  Mary  Arden's  portion  was 
a  trifling  strip  of  land.  Her  father  was  a  well-to-do 
farmer.  It  is  quite  true  that  his  father  was  the  younger 
son  of  a  squire,  but  younger  sons  and  their  sons 
drifted  away  to  anything  in  that  day,  as  we  have 
noticed  at  some  length  in  an  earlier  chapter.  Robert 
Arden,  Mistress  John  Shakespeare's  father  and  the 
poet's  grandfather,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a  fair-sized 
farmer.  He  might  quite  as  likely  have  been  a  wool- 
comber  or  haberdasher  in  Stratford.  County  society 
and  country  town  society,  with  the  partial  cleavage  and 
the  vulgarities  inseparable  from  it,  is  a  comparatively 
modern  development.  Robert  Arden  was  no  doubt 
a  simple  rustic  person,  who  busied  himself  on  his 
farm  at  Wilmecotc  with  sufficient  servants  to  work 
it,  who  in  part  no  doubt  lived  in  the  roomy  little  farm- 
house we  now  see,  and  fed  at  a  common  table,  pre- 
sided over  by  the  good-man  and  his  wife.  That  he 
was  the  grandson  of  a  knight  of  good  estate  made 
probably  little  difference  to  him  one  way  or  the  other. 
The  womenfolk,  below  the  really  great  people  who 
had  also  substantial  possessions  and  rank  to  keep  up, 
had  not  entered  into  social  competition,  nor  begun 
to  make  things  impleasant  for  one  another  and  harass- 


252  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

ing  for  themselves,  inevitable  in  a  country  where  the 
basic  principles  of  a  social  order  have  always,  fortu- 
nately for  England,  been  disregarded.  There  was  no 
reason  for  such.  The  Lucy  ladies  of  Charlecote  did 
not  drive  about  leaving  cards,  nor  give  garden  parties 
to  which  the  ladies  of  Stratford  burned  for  invitations.^ 
Mistress  Arden,  though  her  husband  was  the  grandson 
of  a  knight,  probably  gave  no  thought  to  the  matter 
at  all,  busied  herself  in  a  comparatively  humble  way 
with  her  household  and  servants,  her  conserves,  her 
linen,  and  her  spinning-wheels  like  the  wives  of  a 
thousand  other  squire=^'  grandsons,  who  followed 
commercial  pursuits  of  one  kind  or  another.  It  is 
quite  certain  that  modern  writers,  more  particularly 
of  course  in  fiction,  very  often  concern  themselves 
much  more  with  the  niceties  of  their  subject's  social 
position  than  these  ancients  did  themselves ;  and 
that  half  consciously  they  apply  the  complicated 
standards  of  after  times  to  the  rural  society  of  earlier 
ones,  when,  apart  from  the  splendour  of  the  great, 
everything,  I  take  it,  was  fairly  simple  and  devoid  of 
uncomfortable  self-consciousness.  A  coat  of  arms 
was  an  honest  object  of  ambition,  and  the  ready  way 
in  which  it  was  often  granted  to  country  tradesmen 
and  others  should  serve  to  dim  somewhat  the  in- 
genuous faith  of  most  of  us  that  they  are  inseparable 
from  the  clash  of  knightly  spurs  and  deeds  of  derring- 
do  on  blood-stained  mediaeval  battle-fields.  That  is 
to  say  in  England,  for  in  continental  countries  these 
things  are  of  course  different,  just  as  are,  or  were, 
till  yesterday  their  rigid  castes  of  birth.  When  the 
German,  for  instance,  with  the  significant  but  genuine 
prefix  of  von,  regards  all  Germans  lacking  it  as  of 
inferior  clay,  the  system  may  seem  foolish,  and  has 

^  Note. — It  need  scarcely  be  said  that  no  local  or  personal  signifi- 
cance is  attached  to  the  illustration. 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  253 

obvious  disadvantages  and  dangers,  but  the  attitude 
being  one  of  time-honoured  heredity  is  at  least  consist- 
ent and  certainly  not  vulgar.  Nor  do  I  imagine  there 
was  much  snobbery  in  Shakespeare's  day,  since  cring- 
ing to  great  nobles  wasn't  snobbish,  but  merely 
recognized  custom.  There  was  nothing,  at  all  events, 
approaching  the  exuberant  vulgarity  that  the  loose 
and  healthy  system  of  Britain  bred  later  among 
every  class  to  the  delight  of  two  centuries  of  cynics 
and  satirists.  Mixed  up  as  things  were  in  the  country 
in  Shakespeare's  time,  so  far  as  birth  was  concerned, 
there  could  have  been  hardly  room  for  it.  Robert 
Arden  of  Wilmecote,  for  instance,  took  some  position 
no  doubt,  as  his  worldly  substance  and  his  character 
gave  him.  No  one,  probably  himself  included,  troubled 
to  think  of  the  knightly  ancestor,  not  because  people 
despised  descent  or  good  birth,  but  for  the  fact  that 
there  was  no  part  of  the  social  machinery  in  which 
such  an  indirect  asset  would  be  any  advantage.  One 
cannot  fancy  Mistress  Lucy  saying,  "  Dear  me,  it's 
very  awkward.  Here's  a  man  taken  a  farm  and 
living  like  an  ordinary  farmer,  who,  I'm  told,  is  one  of 
the  Ardens.  Of  course  my  father  and  his  grandfather 
were  friends  and  near  neighbours.  Goodness  knows 
what  his  wife  is  like  ;  some  common  person,  I  suppose. 
I  wonder  if  I  must  call.     What  a  bore !  " 

I  do  not  know  who  Mistress  Robert  Arden  was.  But 
if  these  ladies,  six  miles  apart,  did  not  meet,  which  was 
probable,  with  the  domestic  home-staying  proclivities 
of  women  and  the  bad  roads  of  those  days,  there  was 
probably  no  shadow  of  self-consciousness  on  either 
side.  And  if  peradventure  they  both  went  to  see  one 
of  those  companies  of  players  that  we  are  told  per- 
formed at  times  in  the  guild-hall,  and  met,  I  have  a 
strong  conviction  that  the  well-to-do  farmer's  wife, 
though   an    Arden   by    marriage,    would    render    the 


254  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

precise  amount  of  respect — fulsome,  perhaps,  to  modern 
ears,  but  then  honest  and  customary  to  the  greater  lady 
— without  a  pang,  while  the  other  would  be  hearty  and 
unafraid  and  possessed  of  no  terrors  that  the  other 
was  looking  out  for  a  slight  or  a  flavour  of  patronage. 
As  for  the  Squire  of  Charlecote,  assuming  him  to  be  a 
type,  it  is  tolerably  certain  that  for  cheerful  company 
over  the  bottle  in  his  own  house,  he  would  not  within 
reasonable  limits  have  been  in  the  least  degree  par- 
ticular. And  in  those  days  in  the  country  districts, 
beyond  the  intimate  circle  of  friends  and  relations,  it 
was  only  the  men  who  counted,  and  that  they  practised 
a  catholicity  of  selection  any  one  may  know  who 
concerns  himself  at  all  with  this  period. 

It  is  a  curious  thing,  and  fewer  Americans  than 
Englishmen  will  need  to  be  reminded  of  it,  that  another 
great  but  scantily  recognized  Elizabethan  Captain, 
John  Smith,  the  virtual  founder  of  Virginia,  was  of 
precisely  such  parentage  as  Shakespeare — not  in 
detail,  but  in  substance.  John  Smith's  father  was  a 
tenant  farmer  in  Lincolnshire  of  the  same  vague  remote 
clan  gentility  as  is  claimed  for  Shakespeare.  He,  also, 
owned  a  few  tenements  in  the  little  Lincolnshire  town 
of  Willoughby.  His  mother,  oddly  enough,  had  about 
the  same  social  claims  as  Mary  Arden.  He,  too,  got  a 
grant  of  arms,  but  won  in  his  case  conspicuously  and 
dramatically  by  the  sword,  in  the  sanguinary  wars  of 
the  Austrians  against  the  Turks.  In  Smith's  case, 
again,  one  finds  the  confident  and  unchallenged  appro- 
priation of  the  term  "  gentleman  ",  so  conspicuous  in 
any  lists  of  men  of  that  period,  and  so  misleading  to 
many  American  writers,  who  are  less  advantageously 
equipped  by  situation  for  keeping  their  heads  in 
these  matters  than  Englishmen.  Smith  wrote  himself 
down  "  Gentleman  "  in  quite  youth  without  demur. 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  255 

as  a  farmer's  son,  of  local  grammar-school  education, 
and  long  before  his  coat  of  arms  arrived,  a  designation, 
too,  that  was  obviously  accepted. 

It  is  not  inappropriate  that  one  of  the  oldest  and  most 
picturesque  houses  in  Stratford  should  have  been  the 
residence  of  the  mother  of  John  Harvard,  the  founder 
of  that  famous  American  university.  It  is  a  beautiful 
little  specimen  of  the  half-timbered  Elizabethan  style, 
a  single  gable  fronting  the  street,  of  three  stories,  with 
a  single  long,  mullioned,  latticed  window  almost  filling 
the  space  in  each.  On  the  woodwork  are  carved  the 
bear  of  the  Beauchamps,  the  bull  of  the  Warwicks, 
and  other  badges,  and  under  the  middle  window 
T.  R.  1596  A.  R.,  for  Thomas  and  Alice  Rogers,  the 
parents  of  Katherine  Harvard.  At  the  corner  of 
Bridge  and  High  Streets,  though  wearing  a  modern 
front,  the  house  is  still  standing  where  Shakespeare's 
daughter,  Judith,  and  her  husband,  Quiney,  a  vintner, 
lived.  The  old  parts  of  it  can  be  traced  back  in  the 
town  records  to  the  fourteenth  century.  There  are 
many  other  old  houses,  but  without  any  particular 
associations  attaching  to  them,  and  they  are  more  or 
less  scattered  about  the  town,  in  Sheep  Street  and 
elsewhere.  Among  these  is  a  diminutive  old  tavern 
of  a  kind  not  unusual  in  England,  of  which  I  was  told 
an  exact  replica  had  been  set  up  in  Chicago  by  an 
enthusiastic  individual  of  that  city. 

All  about  the  river,  Stratford  wears  a  singularly 
pleasant  air,  and  breathes  a  fine  sense  of  space;  Bridge 
Street  itself,  which  leads  down  there  and  contains  three 
or  four  of  the  chief  hotels,  being  of  quite  uncommon 
span.  Then  there  are  the  two  well-known  road 
bridges  quite  near  together,  the  one  of  sixteen  arches, 
built  by  Hugh  Clopton,  Lord  Mayor  of  London,  in  the 
early  sixteenth  century,   the  other  erected   about   a 


356  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

hundred  years  ago.  The  beautiful  vista  opening  down 
the  river  to  the  church  has  been  alluded  to  and  is  too 
well  known  to  dwell  upon.  The  Avon  being  here 
forced  out  to  a  considerable  width  and  deepened  by  a 
dam  below  the  town  makes  a  most  picturesque  stretch 
of  water,  gay  in  summer-time  with  boats,  and  on  its 
farther  margin  fringed  by  willows  and  green  fields. 
Over  one  or  other  of  these  bridges,  too,  coaches  and 
brakes  are  constantly  passing,  taking  the  ceaseless 
stream  of  Stratford  pilgrims  on  one  or  other  of  the 
usual  rounds  by  Charlecote,  Hampton,  Lucy,  or 
Edgehill,  by  the  one  bridge  to  Broadway,  and  by  the 
other  to  Campden. 

I  have  never  myself  been  at  Stratford  during  any  of 
the  festival  weeks  when  the  plays  are  being  performed, 
but  at  all  times  the  Shakespeare  Memorial  Theatre  with 
its  collection  of  treasures,  its  view  from  the  tower,  its 
inviting  gardens  fringing  the  river,  and  not  least  the 
splendid  bronze  group  of  figures  within  them  known  as 
the  Shakespeare  Monument  attracts  a  steady  stream 
of  visitors.  This  vast  building,  in  design  and  con- 
struction, has,  I  think,  few  detractors.  It  is  of  necessity 
in  violent  and  prodigious  contrast  to  the  sombre  old 
town  it  overlooks.  But  that  is  inevitable,  and  even 
to  say  so  much  may  be  held  almost  sacrilegious.  For 
Stratford  is  beyond  doubt  the  right  place  in  which 
to  raise  such  a  monument  to  its  great  son.  Above 
all,  to  one  who  gave  such  enduring  proof  that  with  all 
his  prestige  and  his  popularity  he  even  yet  preferred 
his  native  Stratford  to  the  greater  scene  of  his  fame. 

As  I  have  remarked  before  it  is  entertaining  to  note 
how  skilfully  nearly  all  books  by  natives,  dealing  with 
Shakespeare  or  his  country,  contrive  to  ignore  the 
existence  of  the  shires  of  Worcester  and  Gloucester, 
and  the  discreet  manner  in  which  the  fact  of  the  town 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  257 

being  on  the  very  edge  of  Warwickshire  is  suppressed. 
The  local  hand-books  include  remote  places  like  Rugby, 
thirty  miles  away  on  the  farther  fringe  of  the  county, 
and  similar  regions  of  Warwickshire  which  it  is  not 
in  the  least  degree  likely  the  Bard  of  Avon  knew 
anything  of ;  while  neighbouring  villages  on  the  other 
side,  just  over  the  county  border,  such  as  Pebworth, 
Marston,  Welford,  Salford  Priors,  which  must  have  been 
familiar  to  Shakespeare  are  ignored,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  picturesque  charms  of  the  vale  of  Evesham,  Broad- 
way, Camden,  Mickleton,  Meon  Hill,  and  many  such 
others.  The  unknowing  stranger,  so  far  as  guide-books 
can  influence  him,  and  that  is  a  good  long  way  in  the 
case  of  a  man  in  a  hurry,  as  so  many  Stratford  visitors 
appear  to  be,  is  dispatched,  to  quote  a  single  example, 
along  a  rather  dull  road  to  Alcester,  a  town  of  no 
particular  interest,  though  pleasant  enough  in  spite 
of  its  industry  in  needles  and  one  or  two  other 
necessaries,  because  it  is  in  Warwickshire,  while  the  in- 
finitely more  delectable  and  no  lengthier  ways  that  lead 
out  of  Stratford  down  the  valley  into  Worcestershire, 
or  through  Gloucester  to  the  foot  of  the  Cotswolds, 
are  quite  discreetly  omitted.  One  might  not  unfairly 
suspect  some  latent  dread  as  to  the  attractions  of 
that  country  alluring  the  faithful  from  Stratford  hotels 
and  lodging-houses  to  novel  quarters.  But  it  is  the 
same  with  more  exhaustive  publications  and  even 
with  literary  essays.  Every  country  squire  who  may 
possibly  have  seen  Shakespeare  or  talked  with  him 
in  his  years  of  discretion,  and  every  rustic  who  may 
have  drunk  heel  taps  with  him  in  his  supposititiously 
gay  youth  is  naturally  invested  with  some  adventitious 
fame.  But  no  one,  apparently,  a  couple  of  miles  away 
in  Gloucestershire  or  half  a  dozen  miles  down  the  river 
in  Worcestershire,  is  allowed  to  have  had  any  truck 
17 


258  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

with  him.  Little  as  we  know  at  all  of  Shakespeare's 
private  life  it  is  assumed  that  he  only  mixed  with 
Warwickshire  men,  and  some  of  these  living  at  a  great 
distance  are  thus  dug  out  of  obscurity,  and  problemati- 
cally dragged  within  the  magic  circle.  This  is  hard  upon 
the  people  in  the  valley  of  the  Stour,  for  instance,  which 
river  flows  in  just  below  Stratford, and  upon  those  about 
the  Avon  valley  outside  Warwickshire,  upon  whose 
villages  the  very  same  patriotic  historians  sometimes 
assert  that  he  even  made  bad  rhymes. 

I  suppose  there  are  not  many  strangers  who  would 
be  likely  to  spend  an  entire  summer  in  the  Avon  valley. 
But  with  that  rather  exceptional  experience  behind 
me,  originally  undertaken  without  any  previous 
knowledge  of  the  district  in  the  interest  of  this 
little  book,  I  should  like  to  say  that  I  feel  sure  that 
numbers  of  discreet  and  discerning  persons  of  a  certain 
taste  and  temperament,  which  could  be  defined  if 
necessary,  would  find  it  fill  their  notions  of  a  holiday 
to  great  perfection.  If  it  is  not  blasphemous,  I  should 
recommend  them  to  make  their  headquarters  lower 
down  the  river  than  Stratford.  The  latter  can  be 
visited  as  often  as  desired  from  any  point.  As  a  centre 
it  is  admirable  for  a  week,  in  the  case  of  a  foreigner 
or  again  for  an  American,  for  reasons  which  Thave 
already  given.  But  the  English  holiday-maker  with 
serious  intentions  will  do  better  to  make  his  head- 
quarters somewhere  in  the  Evesham  Broadway  or 
Tewkesbury  country,  and  from  thence  do  his  obvious 
duty  by  the  great  spots  upon  the  Upper  Avon,  like 
Stratford  and  Warwick,  which  are  easily  reached  by 
train  or  road.  I  venture  this  advice  with  no  affiliations 
or  predilections  of  any  kind,  and  a  sufficient  acquaint- 
ance with  the  famous  little  river  from  its  source  to 
its  mouth  to  justify  it. 


t 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  259 

The  Stratford  hotel,  as  may  be  imagined,  takes  on  at 
times  a  tolerably  cosmopolitan  flavour,  and  is  capable 
of  affording  to  the  spectator  no  little  entertainment. 
This  varies  with  degree,  but  is  more  likely  to  be 
forthcoming  in  the  less  ambitious  than  in  the  more 
exclusive  hostelry.  I  have  beguiled  several  evenings, 
otherwise  ones  of  small  promise  for  diversion,  by  a 
change  of  scene  in  this  particular.  The  most  cheerful 
by  far  are  those  particular  havens  where  the  citizen 
of  the  type  familiar  in  every  country  town  who  dis- 
cusses his  pipe  and  glass  and  the  affairs  of  the  nation 
with  tolerable  consistency  in  the  same  corner,  there 
meets  the  ever-shifting  tourist  of  the  kind  who  does 
not  dress  for  dinner,  and  frequents  establishments  where 
that  would  be  held  as  a  superfluity.  There  are,  of 
course,  some  local  citizens,  tradesmen,  and  professional 
men  keenly  alive  to  the  Skakespearean  atmosphere, 
and  some  of  them  antiquaries.  But  with  the  average 
specimen  the  effort  to  meet  the  ardent  pilgrim  on  the 
same  plane  of  enthusiasm  is  obviously  too  much,  and 
the  struggle  between  respect  for  persons  who  bring 
money  to  the  town  and  very  much  the  reverse  for  their 
method  of  spending  a  holiday  is  often  painfully  con- 
spicuous. One  can  well  imagine  a  Stratford  sporting 
corn  chandler  or  a  cattle  salesman  being  a  little  over- 
done with  "  Shakespeare,  the  man  "  ! 

It  was  in  one  of  these  profoundly  respectable 
snuggeries  where  the  informal  local  parliament  and 
the  less  fashionable  tourist  meet  one  another  that  I 
discovered,  on  entering,  one  of  the  latter  holding  the 
floor  in  such  unmistakable  fashion  as  to  quite  silence 
the  local  groups,  and  as  he  was  not  talking  about 
Shakespeare,  had  succeeded  in  capturing  their  ear. 
The  subject  of  his  peroration  does  not  matter,  but 
I  think  it  concerned  races  and  dialects.     He  was  a 


26o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

clerk,  I  should  think,  and  spoke  ordinarily  good 
English,  but  with  the  mark  of  a  far  county  upon  it 
clear  as  a  bell,  as  it  so  happened  in  my  ear,  but 
obviously  mystifying  in  no  small  degree  the  mixed 
company  he  was  addressing.  "  And  now,"  said  he,  "  I 
will  stand  a  drink  to  any  gentleman  who  can  guess 
where  I  come  from,"  and  he  passed  the  question 
slowly  round  the  assembly  with  the  look  and  gesture 
of  half  -  schoolmaster,  half  -  auctioneer.  Possibly  he 
was  the  former.  One  man  rated  him  as  a  German, 
which  was  quite  reasonable  ;  another  as  an  Irishman  ; 
another  as  a  Welshman  ;  while  one  brilliantly  suggested 
a  French  Canadian.  A  plain  American,  forced  re- 
luctantly into  speech  by  the  orator's  index  finger 
being  presented,  so  to  speak,  fully  cocked  at  his  head, 
merely  remarked,  "  Well,  sir,  I  reckon  you're  too 
hard  for  me  there ",  proclaiming  thereby  his  own 
section,  at  any  rate.  The  stranger  of  mysterious 
origin  having  apparently  traversed  the  audience,  now 
assumed  the  attitude  of  the  auctioneer  prior  to  drop- 
ping the  hammer,  and  the  closing  of  the  offer  of 
further  refreshment.  Being  inconspicuously  situated 
close  to  the  landlord,  I  was  able  to  prompt  that  worthy 
sotto  voce.  "  Tell  him  he's  a  Tynesider  !  "  said  I.  My 
neighbour  who,  I  am  quite  sure,  had  no  very  lucid  con- 
ception of  the  term,  certainly  not  of  its  significance,  was 
more  than  equal  to  the  occasion,  as  a  Stratford  landlord 
should  be,  and  duly  proceeded  to  inform  the  orator  that 
he  was  a  Tynesider,  that  he  had  known  it  all  along, 
and  had  only  deferred  disclosing  that  obvious  fact 
till  he  had  given  his  guests  a  chance  of  exhibit- 
ing their  penetration,  though  he  did  not  phrase  it 
precisely  thus.  The  Northumbrian  looked  discon- 
certed for  a  moment,  and  his  eye  wandered  sus- 
piciously past  the  burly  figure  of  his  host,  with  his 


i 


r 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  261 

uncompromising  Gloucestershire  accent,  in  my  direc- 
tion. "  Well,  landlord,  what's  it  to  be?  "  And  while 
the  latter,  with  the  advantage  of  intimate  experience, 
called  for  the  soundest  of  his  cordials,  there  was  a 
murmur  of  applause,  the  landlord's  friends  no  doubt 
wondering  at  this  burst  of  inspiration  from  a  son  of 
Avon.  For  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  north-countryman 
was  an  educated  man,  and  spoke  well,  and  had  only 
the  Northumbrian  guttural  or  "  borh  ",  unmistakable  to 
those  who  know  it,  but  puzzling  enough  to  southerners 
not  thus  initiated. 

I    remember    another    evening,  in    very    different 

company,  in  the   smoke-room  of  the  Hotel, 

that  of  six  or  eight  dress  -  coated  and  unutterably 
bored  looking  pilgrims  to  the  shrine,  in  detached  ones 
and  twos,  obviously  half  of  them  middle-aged  Americans 
of  unmistakable  status,  from  Philadelphia  or  New 
York — and  if  this  type  of  a  generation  or  so  ago  was 
more  eager  to  start  a  conversation  in  strange  company, 
which  I  do  not  think  he  really  was,  I  am  quite  sure 
it  is  so  no  longer.  One  or  two  of  them  were  nodding 
over  picture  papers  held  upside  down.  Another  with 
a  very  big  cigar  and  hands  clasped  over  a  comfortable 
protuberance  was  looking  at  the  ceiling,  meditating 
perhaps  upon  the  Birthplace.  Two  or  three  English- 
men had  of  course  resorted  to  cards.  It  was  a  com- 
pany that  in  every  single  case  appeared  to  deprecate 
the  slightest  overture  and  was  quite  determined  to 
be  dull.  A  late  arrival  from  the  dining-room  now 
appeared  of  a  wholly  fresh  type.  He  was  a  spare, 
well-made,  tall  man  of  about  fifty,  and  could  not 
possibly  have  been  mistaken  for  anything  but  an 
English  gentleman  in  any  quarter  of  the  world.  He 
was  not  in  evening  dress,  nor  were  his  grey  clothes 
smart,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word.     They  were 


262  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE  S  COUNTRY 

better,  for  while  pointedly  avoiding  the  latest  lines  of 
the  male  fashion,   they  sat   on  him  beautifully  and 
were  just  the  sort  of  clothes  a  well-bred  middle-aged 
country  gentleman  with  a  figure  can,  with  an  air  of 
seeming  unconcern  about  his  dress,  so  easily  out-class 
the  man  of  fashion  who  shares  his  more  self-conscious 
plumage  with  all  sorts  of  people  that  couldn't  wear 
the  other  to  any  advantage  if  they  tried.     He  had  a 
well-chiselled  face,  combined  with  a  quiet,  self-assured 
expression,    common    to    a    good    many    well-reared 
Englishmen  of  some  mental  capacity  and  accustomed 
to  exercise  authority  in  one  way  or  another.     As  if  to 
emphasize   his   independence   of   the   mode   in   these 
respects,  he  wore  a  silky  auburn  beard  rather  long  and 
not   cut   in  the  modern   fashion.     But   his   methods 
were  not  those  of  the  reserved  and  exclusive-looking 
Englishman  he  appeared,   and  the  last  man  in  the 
room  to  make  a  miscellaneous  acquaintance.     From 
the   very   first   moment   this   apparent    chairman   of 
quarter-sessions  seemed  to  resent  the  almost  prickly 
dullness    of   the   post-prandial    gathering.      He   first 
sat  down  near  the  railroad  king,  who  was  contemplat- 
ing, as  I  mentioned,  at  once  the  end  of  his  cigar  and 
the  ceiling,  but  evidently  gave  him  up  as  hopeless.    He 
then   moved   over   on   the   pretext  of  a   match   and 
gave  the  Philadelphia  banker  with  "The  Graphic" 
upside  down  every  hint  short  of  speech  to  enter  into 
conversation,  but  in  vain.    By  this  time  he  had  begun 
to  interest  me,  as  his  object  was  palpable,  and  the  in- 
vincible stolidity  of  the  others   so   comical.     Finally 
he  landed  on  the  next  chair  to  mine,  and  I  at  once 
gave  him  his    opportunity    by    remarking   that    the 
room  was   getting   a  bit  warm.     "  It   is ",  said   he, 
addressing  the  whole  room  ;  "but  you  would  not  think 
much  of  it  if  you  had  spent  the  last  twenty  years  in 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON  263 

frequent  intimacy  with  one  hundred  and  five  in  the 
shade.  Yes  ",  continued  he,  "  Queensland  can  run  Hell 
as  close  as  any  place  I  know.  Oh  yes,  I  am  under- 
going new  sensations  in  more  ways  than  that.  I  have 
been  back  in  this  country  now  just  two  days,  since  I  was 
thirty,  and  till  three  before  I  sailed  from  Brisbane 
I  hadn't  slept  in  a  bed  for  nineteen  months ".  So 
much  for  my  chairman  of  quarter-sessions  or  old 
established  Master  of  Hounds,  with  just  a  flavour  of 
scholarship  !  The  railway  king's  feet  and  the  fore- 
legs of  his  chair,  which  had  been  tilted  a  trifle,  came 
down  with  a  thud  on  the  floor.  He  still  clasped  his 
waistcoat,  but  both  his  gaze  and  his  cigar  point  re- 
turned to  earth.  The  Phfladelphia  banker  dropped 
"The  Graphic"  and  gave  a  start,  fancying  perhaps 
that  he  had  travelled  in  dreams  to  Wyoming,  and 
that  an  English  lord  was  trying  to  negotiate  a  loan 
to  start  a  cattle  company.  Henceforward  their  eyes 
were  steadily  fixed  on  a  type  they  had  almost  certainly 
never  met  before.  Here  was  a  man  who  had  obviously 
for  years  been  equalling  the  achievements  of  two 
cowboys,  yet  who  looked  like  a  British  aristocrat 
on  his  own  ground,  and  talked  with  the  undiluted 
accent  and  intonation  of  an  Oxford  don  or  a  secre- 
tary at  the  British  Embassy  at  Washington.  All  the 
Americans  began  to  listen.  It  must  have  been 
interesting  and  quite  fresh  no  doubt  to  them  ;  a  breath 
from  the  other,  the  rival  Wild  West  of  the  Antipodes. 
It  would  in  truth  have  been  impossible  for  our  friend 
to  have  led  a  like  life  in  the  Western  States  for  twenty 
years,  and  emerge  with  such  an  exterior  and  such  a 
voice.  His  stories  and  adventures,  however,  were  not 
those  of  an  Oxford  don,  nor  evidentlyhad  he  been  accus- 
tomed of  late  to  take  the  measure  of  his  audience  or  to 
concern  himself  with  their  susceptibilities  or  their  cloth. 


CHAPTER   IX 
TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL 

THOUGH  some  way  removed  from  the  banks  of 
Avon,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  at  the  actual 
source  of  its  tributary  the  Stour,  Compton  Winyates 
is  a  spot  that  every  pilgrim  to  Stratford  finds  his  way 
to  if  time  allows.  And  this  is  quite  right,  for  Lord 
Northampton's  famous  seat  is  probably  the  finest 
instance  of  a  large  Tudor  country  house  untouched  by 
later  innovations  and  dealt  with  kindly  by  the  hand 
of  time  in  the  whole  of  England.  Moreover,  as  the  noble 
owner,  whose  chief  abode  is  at  his  other  seat  of  Castle 
Ashby  in  Northamptonshire,  only  spends  a  month  or 
so  in  the  year  at  this  one,  the  house  is  open  to  the 
public  on  one  day  in  the  week  at  any  rate  throughout 
the  summer. 

I  fail  myself  to  see  much  object  in  dwelling  upon 
the  interiors  of  country  houses  and  castles  that  the 
reader  is  not  in  the  least  likely  ever  to  get  a  sight  of. 
Of  what  particular  interest  can  it  be  to  Mr.  Jones  to 
know  that  "  the  portrait  of  a  lady  "  by  Lely  hangs 
in  her  ladyship's  boudoir,  or  that  the  breakfast-room 
terminates  the  suite  of  apartments  on  the  west  front. 
History  and  legend  are  different.  If  notable  or  dramatic 
deeds  have  been  done  in  a  famous  house,  they  have 
not  only  some  interest  in  themselves,  but  the  mere 
exterior    and    surroundings    help    greatly    to    further 

stimulate  it;  but  there  is  nothing  stimulating  or  interest- 

264 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  265 

ing  to  the  stranger,  as  he  looks  down  the  avenue,  in  the 
knowledge  that  the  dining-room  door  is  made  out  of 
a  fragment  of  the  rood  screen  which  was  demolished 
when  the  parish  church  was  restored  in  the  year  1831. 

Compton    Winyates    may    be    combined    with    an 
extremely  pleasant  round  for  a  person   of   tolerable 
endurance,    compassing    the   valley   of  the  Stour  on 
the  outward  and  the  field  of  Edgehill  on  the  return 
journey.     And  Edgehill,  that  is  to  say  the  long  ridge 
itself,  forms  so  prominent  a  feature  and  landmark, 
and  when  the  Cotswolds  proper  dip  to  earth,  or  would 
do  so,  saves  the  outlook  to  the  southward  from  an 
overtameness  and  lack  of  background  in  such  effective 
fashion,  that  if  no  battle  had  been  fought  there  it 
might  well  claim  notice  as  a  leading  feature  in  the 
Avon  valley.     It  was  a  day  in  early  September  that 
with   myself   alone   for   company   I    adventured   this 
particular  circuit.     Nor  is  the  use  of  the  verb  here 
employed  wholly  apocryphal.     For  I  have  not  often 
seen  the  summer  dress,  the  lush  apparel  of  a  fat  Midland 
country,  lashed  into  such  complete  disarray  as  on  this 
occasion.     For  a  most  violent  south-west  gale,  hurtled 
the  dark,  rain-charged  clouds  too  fast  across  the  sky 
for  the  fulfilment  of  their  obviously  sinister  intentions 
upon  the  still  unstripped  harvest  fields.     The  black- 
ness of  the  outlook,  however,  the  howling  of  the  warm 
summer  tempest,  and  the  clatter  always  raised  when 
a  big  gale  bursts  suddenly  after  a  month  of  summer 
days  upon  an  unsuspecting,  unprotected  town,  most 
successfully  intimidated  Stratford.    Its  floating  popula- 
tion, its  "  transients  ",  as  the  Americans  have  it,  who 
may  generally  be  seen  streaming  away  of  a  morning 
in  every  direction,  by  all  manner  of  methods  evidently, 
upon  this  one,  at  any  rate,  refused  to  face  the  open,  and 
I  am  not  surprised.     I  claim  no  credit  for  being  either 


266  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

more  sanguine  of  the  day  or  less  faint-hearted  :  partly 
because  it  was  my  only  convenient  opportunity  for 
Compton  Winy  at  es,  and  just  a  little  because  a  summer 
or  autumn  gale  with  a  black  sky  has  had  for  me  some  un- 
accountable and  overpowering  fascination  ever  since  I 
can  remember.  Itwastoofar  to  walk.  Themoreorless 
public  conveyance  does  not  come  within  my  scheme  of 
travel  or  my  notions  of  enjoyment,  even  had  such  been 
certain  to  venture  out,  so  I  decided,  unpromising  as  it 
might  appear,  in  favour  of  that  indispensable  machine 
of  all  work,  the  cycle.  After  all,  if  the  wind  absolutely 
dismounts  you  for  a  time,  nay,  for  an  odd  mile  or  so  at 
intervals,  what  does  it  signify  if  the  hours  are  your  own, 
and  it  more  than  makes  amends  when  the  turn  comes. 

I  went  out  of  Stratford  on  this  particular  morning 
into  the  tossing,  battered  country-side,  which  looked 
quite  distraught  against  the  hurrying  murky  skies,  as 
some  solitary  craft  might  put  out  from  port,  where 
prudent  skippers  are  biding  their  time,  into  the 
open  sea.  The  Warwickshire  roads  and  lanes  have 
some  advantage,  to  be  sure,  in  a  high  wind  from  their 
sheltering  trees  and  high  hedges,  but  when  it  comes  to 
a  big  gale  they  have  their  unquestioned  inconveniences. 
For  I  admit  that  with  twigs  and  branches  flying  in 
every  direction  from  brittle  elms,  a  sense  of  relief  comes 
over  me  on  emerging  for  a  space  into  the  open.  Upon 
this  morning  the  roads  were  strewn  with  light  wreckage, 
and  it  was  still  falling  in  intermittent  showers  which 
might  have  been  serious  to  encounter.  Occasionally  a 
few  drops  fell  of  such  individual  proportions  as  threat- 
ened a  deluge  if  the  gale  did  not  hold  them  up.  I  like  to 
see  a  Midland  summer  landscape  in  a  storm.  It  looks 
so  thoroughly  upset,  so  utterly  disconcerted,  as  might  be 
some  gorgeous  dame  exposed  by  an  untoward  fate  to 
the  elements  in  a  garden  party  dress.     Along  the  coast 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  267 

counties  or  near  the  mountains,  storms  at  all  times 
seem  somehow  natural.  One  has  a  fancy  at  least  that 
the  country  is  more  used  to  them,  that  the  trees  bend 
more  readily  to  the  wind,  and  the  hillsides  are  made 
of  sterner  stuff.  But  it  is  good  to  see  the  Midlands 
in  a  gloomy  gale,  a  real  gale,  once  in  a  while.  The 
change  is  delightful,  the  contrast  so  prodigious.  The 
wildness  of  the  sk}^  the  groaning  of  the  great  trees, 
the  tossing  of  the  high  rumpled  leaves  seems  to  give 
the  land  another  character,  and  lends  a  touch  of 
mystery  to  scenes  that  one  knows  will  shed  every 
vestige  of  it  the  moment  the  wind  dies  and  the  sun 
shines  once  more.  The  fat  Warwickshire  landscape 
shakes  off  its  stately  prosmess,  if  the  term  may  be  used 
with  strict  Hmitation  and  without  offence,  and  breaks 
for  the  moment  into  wild  song  and  poetic  suggestion. 

But,  as  I  have  said,  the  pleasures  of  the  day  were 
not  wholly  unalloyed.  Ominous  threat enings  of  a 
disastrous  deluge  splashed  more  than  once  upon  my 
face,  but  by  the  mercy  of  Providence  and  the  sustained 
vigour  of  the  gale,  were  not  fulfilled,  while  the  trees 
continued  to  scatter  their  lighter  wreckage  through 
the  air.  I  took  a  road  on  this  occasion  which  I  had 
travelled  before  under  less  interesting  but  more 
materially  comfortable  conditions,  namely,  that  which 
ascends  the  gentle  gradients  01  the  valley  of  the 
Stour.  To-day,  however,  it  was  practically  deserted, 
the  only  outdoor  life  stirring  seemed  to  be  about  the 
occasional  stackyards  by  the  roadside  whence  came 
the  shouts  of  men,  and  straws  from  hastily  covered 
or  half-finished  ricks,  whirling  wildly  on  the  wind. 

Villages,  however,  wear  an  infinitely  better  face  in 
sunshine  than  in  storm.  They  belong  pre-eminently 
to  the  decorative  aspect  of  the  country-side,  and 
Clifford   Chambers,    the   first   upon   the   road,   comes 


268  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

back  to  me  from  a  former  journey  on  it,  when  all  the 
world  was  bright  though  the  road  was  much  more 
dusty.  Clifford  sits  upon  the  little  Stour  (pronounced 
Stower),  which  runs  hereabouts  at  a  quite  creditable 
pace.  One  assumes  very  naturally  that  this  Clifford 
was  one  of  the  innumerable  manors  of  that  powerful 
and  acquisitive  stock  which  spread  irom  the  Welsh 
border  to  power  and  glory  in  the  north,  and  terminated 
in  the  days  of  the  Protectorate  with  that  doughty 
Lady  Anne,  Countess  of  Pembroke.  But  this  little 
village  has  no  such  origin — according  to  my  friend  the 
vicar  of  Whitchurch,  who  is  the  final  authority  here 
and  in  a  good  many  other  places — acquiring  its  name, 
long  before  this  arrogant  Norman  stock  were  heard 
of  on  English  soil,  from  the  physical  cause  so  obvious 
in  its  two  syllables.  So  much  for  the  Clifford  or 
Clifort.  As  to  the  Chambers,  the  mill  and  manor  seem 
to  have  been  allotted  as  a  stipend  to  the  "chamberer" 
or  "  house  steward  "  of  the  great  abbey  of  Gloucester, 
to  whom  it  once  belonged. 

Atherstone  follows  next  upon  the  right,  just  across 
the  Stour,  in  a  woody  valley  where  the  spire  of  a  debased 
Victorian  church  rises  above  a  picturesque  hamlet  of 
thatched  roofs.  Close  to  the  church,  set  upon  the  site 
and  amid  the  graveyardof  an  ancient  one,  is  a  singularly 
fine  specimen  of  a  Queen  Anne  farmhouse  in  red  brick. 
There  is  an  ancient  mill  here  too,  which  within  memory 
was  worked  as  a  fulling  mill.  The  authority  just  quoted 
tells  me  that  the  site  as  a  corn  mill  was  valued  in  1086 
at  los.  and  "  ten  sticks  of  eels".  In  the  graveyard 
some  lines  upon  the  tomb  of  a  young  woman,  who  died 
at  thirty-three,  end  in  a  manner  quite  felicitous  by  com- 
parison with  the  usual  doggerel  of  such  compositions  : 

Let  none  suppose  they  can  repent  too  soon, 
f.  For  I  found  night,  before  I  thought  it  noon. 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  269 

But  these  little  villages  after  all  are  just  off  the 
Shipston  road.  The  first  place  of  note  abutting 
actually  upon  the  highway  is  Alscot  Park,  the  house 
appearing  at  the  end  of  a  magnificent  elm  avenue. 
Apart  from  the  glory  of  the  timber,  which,  dating 
from  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  must  be 
approaching  the  limit  of  years  generally  allotted  to 
the  elm,  some  further  interest  attaches  to  the  trees 
as  the  nurslings  of  the  famous  antiquary  James  West, 
who  purchased  the  property  with  his  wife's  dowry 
from  the  Marriott  family,  and  whose  descendants  still 
enjoy  it.  The  Marriotts  were  not  here  long,  but  their 
tenure  has  some  special  interest,  as  the  first  one  was 
a  ward  of  Shakespeare's  old  Stratford  friend  Combe, 
who  may  have  had  a  hand  in  marrying  him  to  the 
heiress  of  Alscot,  which  belonged  to  the  Brownes,  rich 
vintners  of  the  city  of  London.  Here  we  have  another 
of  the  innumerable  instances  of  wealthy  traders 
turning  landowners,  while  a  town  burgher,  in  fact,  is 
trustee  and  guardian  to  a  wealthy  young  knight  of 
ancient  family,  a  triangular  arrangement  which  would 
play  havoc  with  the  social  history  of  England  as 
depicted  in  the  woolly  and  complacent  imagination 
of  that  eminent  family  authority  and  genealogist 
Aunt  Maria,  so  often  alluded  to. 

The  pretty  village  of  Alderminster  sits  across  the 
road  just  beyond  the  park  of  Alscot.  Within  an  ample 
graveyard,  well  shaded  by  ancient  trees  and  enclosed 
by  a  wall  which  borders  the  village  road,  rises  the  fine 
cruciform  church  of  Norman  foundation,  and  from  the 
first,  as  now,  a  cruciform  building.  There  is  within  it 
a  great  deal  of  interesting  Early  English  work.  The 
chancel  is  lighted  by  four  lancets  upon  either  side,  and 
the  east  window  consists  of  a  triplet  of  the  same, 
deeply  splayed.     The  central  tower  is  later   and   is 


270  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

singularly  massive,  with  pinnacles  and  gargoyles  at 
the  corners  and  a  bell  turret  at  the  south-east  corner. 
There  are  no  monuments  of  interest,  however,  within 
or  without.  The  situation  of  the  massive  old  church 
is  exceptionally  pleasing,  resting  as  it  does  amid  its 
venerable  trees  and  hoary  gravestones  on  a  high  ledge 
which  slopes  on  one  side  to  the  Stour,  and  on  the  other, 
as  already  implied,  is  bordered  by  the  village  highway. 

Pursuing  the  Shipston  road  southward  one  is  always 
raised  up  a  little,  and  on  a  clear  day  can  enjoy  a  wide 
prospect  over  the  country  we  have  left  behind  us  in 
Worcestershire :  the  Cotswolds  and  the  upper  vale  of 
Evesham,  with  Meon  Hill  prominent  and  isolated  in 
the  forefront  on  the  south-west.  For  such,  however, 
and  for  these  other  details  here  briefly  noted,  which 
imply  a  leisurely  course  and  a  sunny  day,  memory 
goes  behind  the  tempestuous  morn  that  issues  in  this 
chapter. 

Where  the  Stour  crosses  the  road  beyond  Alder- 
minster  it  discloses  a  charming  foreground  prospect 
of  its  winding  course  through  Ettington  Park,  an 
ancient  seat  of  the  Shirley  family  who  are  still  in 
possession,  and  seem  quite  credibly  to  have  owned  it 
continuously  since  the  time  of  the  Norman  Conquest. 
A  portion  at  least  of  the  present  park,  my  cicerone  tells 
me,  has  been  enclosed  for  deer  since  at  least  the  time 
of  Henry  VHI.  The  house  suggests  in  its  appearance 
no  particular  interest,  having  been  partly  rebuilt  and 
altogether  refaced,  but  close  by  it  is  the  old  twelfth 
century  church,  disused  now  for  over  a  hundred  years 
and  heavily  draped  in  ivy.  The  Ettington  family 
have  had  in  recent  years  their  own  antiquary  and 
historian,  the  late  Mr.  Evelyn  Shirley,  and  in  his  book 
may  be  read  by  the  curious  the  story  of  a  singularly 
tenacious  stock.     There  are  some  old  effigies  in  the 


TO  COMPTON  WIN  YATES  AND  EDGEHILL  271 

ruined  church  of  a  Sir  Ralph  Shirley  and  his  wife,  of 
date  1327.  Beside  the  highway  here,  and  visible  also 
in  other  places,  are  the  remains  of  an  old  line  that 
might  be  mistaken  for  an  abortive  railroad  enterprise. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  the  relic  is  much  more  interesting, 
and  belongs  to  a  period  earlier  than  the  first  steam 
railroad. 

If  I  had  done  my  duty  in  regard  to  the  sights  of 
Stratford,  which  I  feel  quite  sure  I  did  not,  such  an 
army  of  writers  having  exhausted  every  detail  of  it, 
I  should  have  mentioned  that  the  second  and  modern 
bridge  over  the  Avon  there  was  erected  to  carry  a 
horse  tramway  to  Shipston ;  that  the  line  itself 
was  finished  with  a  view  to  making  others  like  it, 
and  so  becoming  a  section  of  a  network  of  com- 
munications throughout  this  part  of  England.  It 
actually  ran  for  many  years,  carrying  goods  and 
passengers,  but  collapsed  of  course  before  the  power 
of  steam  and  Stephenson.  Its  grass-grown  trail  and 
solid  embankments  alone  remain  to  remind  one  of 
the  most  momentous  epoch  in  industrial  history : 
that  tremendous  revolution  which  crushed  to  pieces 
in  brief  space  a  thousand  minor  interests,  themselves 
regarded  as  the  very  last  word  of  progress  for  all 
reasonable  time  ! 

At  Halford,  a  mile  beyond,  there  is  a  church  of 
Norman  origin,  still  retaining  a  good  deal  of 
Norman  work,  and  one  of  the  bells  which  hang  in 
the  tower  is  of  thirteenth  century  date,  and  the  oldest 
in  Warwickshire.  The  Roman  road,  known  as  the 
Fosseway  here,  crossed  the  Stour,  now  spanned  by  a 
fourteenth  century  bridge,  around  which  a  memorable 
skirmish  was  fought  in  the  Civil  War.  Tredington 
comes  next,  with  a  fine  church  containing  some  Saxon 
walls  pierced  by  Norman  arches.     The  seating  of  a 


272  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

church  is  rarely  of  much  archaeological  interest,  but 
that  of  Tredington  has  the  unusual  distinction  of 
being  pre-Reformation.  Passing  Honnington  Park, 
where  is  a  house  built  by  the  Parkers  in  the  time 
of  William  of  Orange,  one  is  soon  in  the  little  market 
town  of  Shipston  that  has  exchanged  its  position  as 
the  terminus  of  a  horse  tram  in  the  time  of  the 
Regency  for  the  terminus  of  a  branch  line  from 
Stratford,  which  has  followed  us  all  the  way  here. 

I   have  been  in  Shipston  many  times,   but   have 
never  discovered  anything  in  its  quiet  streets  beyond 
the  necessities  of  meat  and  drink,  and  on  one  occasion 
a  drenching  rain  to  detain  me.     It  belongs  to  the 
county  of  Worcester,  and  the  country  all  about  takes 
on  a  more  broken  character,  merging  gradually  into 
the  Cotswolds.     The  head  waters  of  the  Stour,  too, 
above  the  town,  are  natural  trout  streams,  and  the 
characteristics  of  that  Cotswold  country,  with  which 
we  are  not  concerned  here,  are  strongly  in  evidence. 
I   was  glad   enough   on   this   boisterous   occasion   to 
turn  with  the  wind,  which  continued  in  all  its  violence, 
though  it  held  up  the  rain,  and  face  eastward  for  the 
secluded    hills    and    hollows    amid    which    Compton 
Winyates  lies  in  peaceful  isolation.     This  is  not  by 
any  means  the   shortest  way  from  Stratford,  but  I 
was  anxious  to  see  Brailes,  whose  large  church  forms 
a  notable  landmark  in  the  plain  from  any  one  of  the 
many  surrounding  heights  over  which  roads  climb. 
Brailes  Church  is  often  styled  the  "  Cathedral  of  the 
Feldon",  and  is  in  fact  over  i6o  feet  long,  and  possesses 
a  noble  and  massive  fifteenth  century  tower  120  feet 
high,    with    an    embattled    parapet    and    pinnacles. 
Some  thirteenth  century  lancets,  triplets  in  the  south 
aisle,  are  the  oldest  work  in  the  church.     There  is  also 
a  fine  clerestory  to  the   nave,   with   twelve  square- 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  273 

headed  two-light  windows.  The  chancel  is  fourteenth 
century  with  a  particularly  fine  east  window  in  the 
decorated  style  of  five  lights  and  graceful  tracery. 
A  lofty  perpendicular  arch  opens  into  the  tower  at 
the  west  end,  disclosing  a  fine  perpendicular  window. 
Before  the  altar  lie  some  slabs  covering  the  dust  of 
the  Bisshop  family,  who  were  patrons  of  the  church 
in  the  sixteenth  century  ;  but  the  manor  had  be- 
longed to  the  Sheldons,  who  were  great  landowners 
hereabouts,  and  could  ride,  it  was  commonly  said, 
from  Brailes  to  Broadway,  where,  it  may  be  remem- 
bered, we  have  already  met  them  on  their  domain. 

There  is  something  delightfully  snug  about  the 
situation  of  Compton  Winyates,  though  no  one  of 
course  in  these  days  would  build  a  house  in  the 
bottom  of  a  punch  bowl.  Perhaps,  too,  the  tempest- 
uous state  of  the  weather  added  something  to  the 
attraction.  For  while  the  narrow  leafy  lanes  that  led 
up  to  the  brim  of  the  green  cup,  in  whose  hollow 
the  beautiful  old  house  lay  silent  and  peaceful,  were 
in  an  uproar  of  blowing  leaves  and  hurtling  twigs, 
on  getting  down  to  the  lawn  the  lightest  possible 
airs  were  moving,  and  one  could  have  lit  a  match 
without  difficulty.  It  is  not  merely  that  the  house 
lies  in  a  small  basin,  but  the  basin  contains  all  that 
there  is  of  garden  lawn,  parkland,  and  grove,  the 
last  two  spreading  up  in  graceful  sheltering  sweep 
from  the  flat  on  which  the  mansion  itself,  with  its  old 
gardens,  terraces,  and  ponds,  is  set.  The  whole  thing 
is  in  a  small  compass,  while  all  around  it  is  a  broken 
and  pretty  and  altogether  aloof-from-the-world  sort 
of  country,  and  the  most  picturesque  corner  of  War- 
wickshire, By  the  road  we  have  travelled  in  this 
chapter  it  is  about  sixteen  miles  from  Stratford, 
From  whichever  side  you  approach  it,  its  beautiful 
18 


274  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

chimney  stacks  and  mellow  red  walls  burst  on  you 
suddenly  at  close  quarters,  and  though  always  above 
it,  the  effect  is  nevertheless  singularly  felicitous. 

A  more  beautiful  display  of  battlement  and  gable, 
of  grey  roof  and  twisted  chimney,  of  irregular  yet 
symmetrical  grouping  of  towers  and  turrets,  of  Tudor 
windows  of  every  size  and  form  of  beauty,  it  would 
be  difficult  to  conceive.  And  when  one  remembers 
that  the  whole  house  was  built  in  the  early  years 
of  Henry  VHI,  despite  the  familiar  glories  of  the 
Tudor  builders,  one  is  almost  startled  at  the  thought 
that  men  who  had  lived  through  the  dark  period  of 
the  Wars  of  the  Roses  could  survive  to  see  such  a 
triumph  of  domestic  architecture  as  this,  and  that,  too, 
reared  like  this  one  in  the  very  heart  of  the  country. 
Built,  with  the  exception  of  the  gateway  block,  of 
brick  that  has  acquired  the  tone  and  colouring  every 
one  is  familiar  with  in  Hampton  Court  and  some 
Cambridge  colleges,  a  charming  extraneous  touch  is 
further  given  by  the  clematis,  roses,  and  ivy,  which 
with  due  discrimination  are  permitted  to  flourish  here 
and  there  without  damage  to  the  lines  of  the  fabric  or 
the  colour  effect  of  wall  and  tower. 

Set  round  a  quadrangle  nearly  60  feet  square,  the 
house  gathers  further  size  and  dignity  in  its  outside 
view  from  this  design.  It  is,  moreover,  so  picturesquely 
varied  in  its  external  detail  that  its  appearance  at 
each  of  the  four  sides  is  quite  distinct.  Over  the 
great  embattled  front  porch,  in  which  the  original 
oak  door  remains,  are  the  arms  of  Henry  VHI,  sup- 
ported by  a  griffin  and  a  greyhound,  and  surmounted 
by  a  crown,  with  those  of  Catherine  of  Aragon  in 
one  of  the  spandrels.  To  take  the  reader  through 
the  many  and  beautiful  halls  and  chambers,  the 
intricate  mazes,  with  their  hiding-holes  of  this  superb 


TO  COMPTON  WIN  YATES  AND  EDGEHILL  275 

old  house  is  not  my  purpose.  But  the  additions  have 
been  so  slight,  the  restoration  so  limited  and  so  careful, 
that  the  visitor  may  fairly  picture  himself  in  actual 
touch  with  the  highest  domestic  aspirations  of  the 
early  Tudor  period.  Personal  history  is  always 
more  interesting  in  the  narration  than  architecture, 
and  should  be  so.  The  one  is  meant  to  look  at,  the 
other  only  lives  in  story,  and  that  of  the  rise  of  the 
Comptons  to  supreme  position  has  a  touch  of  both 
humour  and  romance  in  it  which  has  kept  it  locally 
green.  Here,  again,  we  have  the  old,  old  English 
story,  and  one  scarcely  known  upon  the  Continent  of 
Europe — the  marriage,  that  is  to  say,  of  the  noble  to 
the  trader's  daughter. 

The  Comptons  were  not  by  any  means  new  people. 
One  of  them  was  knight  of  the  shire  in  the  time  of 
Edward  III,  but  they  got  no  further  than  that  till 
another  became  ward  of  the  Crown  as  a  boy,  and  was 
brought  up  with  Henry  VIII.  The  prince  took  a  fancy 
to  him,  and  when  he  came  to  the  throne  gave  him  the 
custody  of  the  park  and  ruinous  castle  of  Fullbrook, 
near  Warwick,  which  had  been  built  by  the  Duke  of 
Bedford,  of  French  war  fame,  and  son  of  Henry  V. 
Compton  owned  the  land  at  Winyates,  a  corruption 
of  "  Vineyards ",  and  utilized  his  stewardship,  no 
doubt  legitimately,  by  hauling  the  material  from  Full- 
brook,  and  building  the  noble  house  for  which  remote 
posterity,  as  well  as  his  own  descendants,  have  to 
thank  him.  Not  every  one  who  has  pulled  down 
castles  and  monasteries  has  made  such  good  use  of 
them.  The  chimneys,  says  tradition,  were  conveyed 
there  in  panniers  carried  by  donkeys.  His  grandson 
Henry  was  created  Baron  Compton  of  Compton  by 
Queen  EUzabeth  in  1572,  and  visited  bj^  her  the  same 
year ;  the  chamber  in  which  she  lay,  as  well  as  that 


276  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

tenanted  by  her  father  at  an  earher  date,  being  duly 
cherished.  It  was  Henry's  son,  WiUiam,  however,  in 
the  last  year  of  the  century  who  fell  in  love  with 
Alderman  Spencer's  daughter. 

This  gentleman,  commonly  known  as  "rich  Spencer  ", 
quite  in  twentieth  century  fashion  thought  his  daughter 
could  make  a  better  match,  and  absolutely  refused  to 
sanction  this  one.  Thus  thwarted,  the  resourceful 
gallant  bribed  the  alderman's  baker  to  let  him  take 
his  place  one  morning.  So  young  Compton,  thus  dis- 
guised, carried  the  daily  supply  of  loaves  to  the  Spencer 
establishment  at  so  prompt  and  early  an  hour  that, 
meeting  its  master  accidentally,  he  was  presented  with 
a  sixpence  and  a  word  of  commendation  on  his  meri- 
torious punctuality.  When  the  pseudo  baker,  how- 
ever, had  deposited  his  loaves,  the  young  lady  took 
their  place  in  the  basket  and  was  carried  away  by  her 
triumphant  lover.  The  triumph,  however,  was  sadly 
marred  by  the  unappeasable  wrath  of  the  outraged 
parent,  who  promptly  proceeded  to  disinherit  his 
daughter,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  she  had  been  duly 
and  lawfully  united  to  the  adventurous  nobleman. 
Disinherited,  too,  she  would  apparently  have  remained 
if  it  had  not  been  for  the  good  offices  of  Queen  Elizabeth, 
whose  sympathy,  even  in  her  old  age,  with  the  enter- 
prises of  thwarted  lovers  was  notorious.  For  when 
the  first  child  was  born,  Her  Majesty,  without  entering 
into  particulars,  paid  Sir  John  the  compliment  of 
asking  him  to  stand  co-sponsor  with  her  at  the  baptism 
of  an  infant  protege,  stipulating  that  he  should  also 
adopt  it.  The  astute  merchant  fell  into  the  trap  and 
found  himself  at  the  font  in  the  capacity  of  adopted 
parent  of  his  own  grandson,  and  all  went  happily  ever 
after.  At  any  rate,  the  money  did,  and  enriched  the 
lords  of  Winyates  to  the  enormous  extent  for  those 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  277 

days  of  not  less  than  £300,000.  Shakespeare,  we  are 
told,  with  that  curious  air  of  confidential  intimacy 
with  the  mysterious  genius  affected  by  the  lighter- 
hearted  Stratfordian  annalist,  knew  the  story  well, 
and  utilized  it  in  the  scene  of  Falstaff  and  the  linen 
basket  in  "  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor '  . 

Shakespeare,  by  ordinary  inference,  must  of  course 
have  known  the  story  ;  but  the  device  in  various  shapes 
is  as  old  as  the  hills,  and  there  is  a  little  hitch,  too,  here 
as  to  whether  the  play  in  question  was  not  written 
some  time  before  the  Spencer-Compton  escapade.  A 
few  years  afterwards  James  I,  while  on  a  visit  to 
Compton  Winyates,  which  had  been  thus  honoured  both 
by  Henry  VIII  and  Ehzabeth,  created  the  fortunate 
owner  Earl  of  Northampton.  The  room  occupied  by  the 
former  bears  his  name,  and  the  window  still  contains 
some  old  stained  glass  exhibiting  the  Tudor  rose  and 
the  arms  of  Catherine  of  Aragon.  Charles  I  was  also 
a  visitor  here,  and  his  chamber,  with  a  spiral  staircase 
opening  out  of  it,  is  held  in  remembrance.  The  house 
was  seized  and  held  by  the  Parliamentary  troops  for 
most  of  the  Civil  War  and  not  seriously  besieged. 

Not  a  soul  was  about  on  the  occasion  of  my  visit, 
and  down  in  this  strangely  sheltered  hollow  the  perfect 
silence  of  the  old  house  made  an  impressive  contrast 
to  the  agonized  tossing  of  the  woods  which  crested  the 
near  sheltering  ridge  and  the  roaring  of  the  wind  in 
the  great  elms  that  stood  high  enough  to  feel  its 
force. 

The  church  which  stands  near  by  in  the  grounds 
was  only  built  after  the  Restoration,  in  place  of  one 
destroyed  during  the  Civil  War ;  but  some  of  the  old 
monuments  were  recovered  and  still  survive  beside 
those  of  later  date.  Among  the  former  is  an  effigy 
of  the  builder  of  the  house.  Sir  William  Compton,  with 


278  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

that  of  his  wife.  Another  is  his  grandson,  Henry,  first 
Baron  Compton,  who  was  one  of  the  judges  at  the 
trial  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  with  both  his  wives. 
Many,  too,  of  the  Spencers  of  Althorpe  are  lying  here 
with  family  banners  and  hatchments.  Under  one  of 
the  former,  that  of  Peter  Compton,  who  died  in  1542, 
hangs  a  surcoat  and  a  helmet.  By  way  of  contrast 
at  the  west  end  of  the  church  is  the  grave  of  one  Jane 
Story,  a  reputed  witch  who  died  in  1753. 

The  battle-field  of  Edgehill  is  some  five  miles  from 
here,and  the  way  thither  lies  through  such  a  sequestered 
region  for  this  somewhat  populous  heart  of  England 
that  its  memory  always  abides  with  me  as  a  pleasur- 
able departure  in  this  particular.  The  long  ridge,  in 
fact,  which  terminates  in  such  abrupt  and  conspicuous 
fashion  where  the  battle  was  fought,  and  more  par- 
ticularly appropriates  on  that  account  the  famous 
name,  stretches  nearly  to  Compton  Winyates.  Indeed, 
I  took  the  road  that  mounts  up  on  to  it  almost  immedi- 
ately by  the  advice  of  a  rustic  rather  than  the  alter- 
native of  slipping  down  into  the  valley  and  travelling 
along  its  foot.  By  this  method,  however,  one  misses 
the  village  of  Tysoe,  which  not  only  possesses  an 
interesting  and  ancient  church,  but  witnessed  the 
meeting  of  Charles  I  and  his  queen,  after  a  long  separa- 
tion, at  a  moment  in  October  1643  so  auspicious  for 
their  arms,  that  a  medal  was  struck  to  commemorate 
a  reunion  so  doubly  fortunate. 

The  ridge  road  here,  lifted  some  500  feet  above 
the  lowland  of  Warwickshire,  though  now  and  again 
giving  the  traveller  the  benefit  of  outlook  incident  to 
its  elevation,  is  thrust  for  the  most  part  so  far  back 
on  the  plateau  that  no  great  advantage  of  this  kind 
in  fact  attaches  to  it.  As  there  seems  little  traffic 
here  of  any  sort,  the  note  perhaps  is  scarcely  worth 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  279 

making.  For  myself,  I  pursued  this  solitary  trail  at 
peace  with  the  wind,  which  was  now  beginning  to  tire, 
and  was  in  any  case  behind  me.  Persistently  it  forged 
along,  apparently  untravelled  and  certainly  undwelt 
upon,  and  for  the  most  part  fenced  about  with  tall 
and  never-ending  screens  of  overgrown  hedge  timber, 
where  specimens  of  every  normal  woodland  tree  known 
in  England  seemed  struggling  for  mastery  in  a  de- 
lightful chaos,  festooned  with  autumn  berries  and  all 
bustling  with  feasting  birds.  It  reminded  me  of  my 
Roman  road  near  Evesham,  and  wore  the  same  alluring 
air  of  being  altogether  outside  the  scheme  of  things. 
Indeed,  I  began  to  think  it  was,  and  to  wonder  whither 
it  was  leading  me,  or  whether  so  deserted  a  highway 
could  possibly  land  one  at  a  haunt  so  well  known 
as  Edgehill,  At  length,  however,  we  emerged  into 
civilization  and  upon  the  outskirts  of  a  large  farm, 
and  not  far  beyond  it  the  tower  which  commemorates 
the  battle  came  in  sight. 

The  ridge  upon  which  Charles  I  camped  the  night 
before,  and  from  which  in  the  morning  he  descended 
to  fight  the  first  big  battle  of  the  war,  is  from  even  a 
mere  physical  point  of  view  the  most  striking  spot  in 
the  Midlands.  Hills,  heights,  ridges,  and  valleys,  as 
familiar  features  on  paper  in  the  plan  and  story 
of  famous  battles,  are  apt  to  shrivel  sadly  at  close 
quarters.  But  there  is  no  mistake  about  Edgehill. 
The  country  at  the  back — to  the  southward,  that  is 
in  the  direction  of  Banbury  and  Oxford — trends  by 
slow  degrees  to  an  altitude  of  at  this  point  about 
700  feet  and  then  falls  precipitately  into  the  plain. 

Among  a  group  of  houses,  one  or  two  of  which  are 
associated  with  the  entertainment  of  the  numerous 
visitors  who  come  here,  is  a  quite  unconvincing  looking 
battlemented   tower    of   considerable   height.     What- 


28o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

ever  its  failures  to  achieve  a  mediaeval  aspect,  having 
been  erected  in  the  eighteenth  century,  it  has  the 
saving  merit  of  providing  you  from  its  summit,  which 
is  reached  by  many  stairs,  with  a  prodigiously  ex- 
pansive view,  and  a  further  one  of  occupying  the  very 
spot  where  the  Royal  Standard  was  planted  on  the 
morning  of  the  fight.  With  regard  to  the  first,  con- 
sidering the  atmospheric  conditions  under  which  I 
tested  it,  I  have  to  take  on  faith  the  statement  that 
you  can  see  such  widely  sundered  shires  as  those  of 
Bucks,  and  Brecon  of  Nottingham,  and  Cheshire ; 
but  I  am  quite  sure  it  is  true,  though  the  association 
of  the  first  two,  if  one  did  not  know  the  topography 
of  these  parts,  is  calculated  to  put  something  of  a 
strain  on  the  credibility. 

For  myself,  however,  the  presence  of  the  famous 
battle-field  was  the  overmastering  sensation  of  the 
moment,  though  the  surprise  of  finding  it  so  infinitely 
more  dramatic  in  situation  than  distant  views  of 
Edgehill  had  lead  one  to  suppose,  added  no  little  to 
one's  historic  emotions.  The  steep  declivity  leading 
to  the  battle-plain,  which  last  spreads  away  towards 
Kineton,  is  now  clad  with  large  timber,  and  the  fact 
of  looking  down  on  to  it  over  the  tops  of  their  luxuriant 
foliage  contributes  sensibly  to  the  allurements  of  the 
spot  as  well  as  to  the  sense  of  commanding  alti- 
tude so  strikingly  experienced.  The  battle  of  Edge- 
hill  was  fought  upon  Sunday,  23rd  October  1642.  The 
King's  Standard  had  been  raised  in  the  preceding 
August  at  Nottingham,  whence  he  had  moved  west- 
ward to  Shrewsbury  with  a  view  of  augmenting  his 
forces  in  the  strong  Loyalist  counties  of  the  Welsh 
borderland.  Essex,  commanding  the  Parliamentary 
forces,  had  in  the  meanwhile  moved  forward  as  far 
as  Worcester.     But  when    the    king   started    on    his 


TO  COMPTON  WIN  YATES  AND  EDGEHILL  281 

march  for  London,  which  city  was  his  objective  point, 
Essex  abandoned  Worcester  with  the  intention  of 
intercepting  him,  and  the  two  armies  finally  came 
face  to  face  upon  this  henceforward  memorable  spot. 
That  of  the  king  spent  the  preceding  night  upon  the 
high  ground,  that  of  Essex  lay  in  and  about  Kineton, 
a  large  village  some  two  miles  from  the  ridge  foot. 

The  king  had  rather  the  advantage  in  numbers 
at  the  moment,  some  14,000  foot  and  4000  horse. 
Essex  intended  to  remain  over  Sunday  at  Kineton 
till  another  division  of  horse,  foot,  and  artillery  came 
up  which  would  have  about  equalized  matters.  This 
state  of  things,  however,  was  discovered  by  Rupert, 
who  was  practically,  though  not  literally,  chief  in 
command,  and  it  was  decided  to  seize  the  opportunity. 
The  Royal  army  then  mustered  from  its  various 
encampments,  and  marching  to  the  brink  of  the  ridge 
formed  up  in  sight  of  the  enemy,  which  at  the  same 
time  were  moving  out  from  Kineton  and  extend- 
ing themselves  in  the  plain  below,  a  stretch  of  open 
common  land  with  scarcely  an  enclosure  upon  it. 
Charles  did  not  abandon  a  strong  position  from  folly, 
like  the  Scots  at  Dunbar  a  few  years  later,  or  like  his 
ancestor  James  IV  of  Scotland  at  Flodden  in  the 
preceding  century  because  he  was  cut  off  from  his 
base,  but  simply  because  Essex  had  no  inducement  to 
scale  the  heights,  being  in  no  hurry,  while  the  king  was, 
for  the  reasons  above  stated.  So  at  one  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon  the  Royal  army  marched  down  the  hill 
and  the  others  prepared  to  meet  them. 

There  are  in  truth  no  slight  points  of  resemblance 
between  the  first  impact  of  these  two  amateur  armies 
and  of  those  which,  across  the  Atlantic  a  little  more 
than  two  centuries  later,  met  at  the  first  battle  of 
Manassas.     The  professional  element  was  so  small  in 


282  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

both  as  to  count  for  little.  In  the  later  conflict,  though 
the  points  in  dispute  had  of  course  scarcely  anything 
in  common,  the  sides,  their  backbone  at  any  rate, 
represented  the  Puritan  element  very  distinctly  on 
the  one  hand  and  the  cavalier  element  almost  as  faith- 
fully upon  the  other.  As  in  the  older  war,  too,  one 
party  to  the  American  struggle  had  the  advantage  of 
being  more  generally  accustomed  to  the  saddle  and 
to  fire  -  arms  than  their  opponents,  and  curiously 
enough  in  each  case  the  possessors  of  these  physical 
advantages  were  the  ultimate  losers.  But  I  was 
thinking  rather  of  the  drift  of  the  two  fights  and  the 
conduct  of  the  combatants.  I  admit  that  my  im- 
pressions of  Bull  Run  are  drawn  mainly  from  personal 
friends  and  acquaintances,  and  those  not  a  few  who 
fought  in  it.  Nor  were  their  reminiscences  those  of  a 
day  or  a  week  or  even  a  year.  I  heard  them  very 
often  and  could  not  have  got  away  from  them  even 
had  I  wished  to,  and  I  fear,  with  the  impatience  of 
youth,  though  no  bad  listener  I  am  now  thankful  to 
say,  I  should  have  been  occasionally  not  sorry  to 
escape.  What  would  one  now  give  for  only  an  hour 
with  some  of  the  men  or  officers  who  fought  under 
Rupert  and  Essex  !  But  in  regard  to  the  first  battle 
of  Manassas,  my  friends  were  all  on  the  victorious 
side,  while  Edgehill  was  of  course  a  drawn  battle. 
They  were  quite  candid  as  to  their  glorious  confusion 
concerning  the  progress  of  the  events  upon  that 
famous  day  in  which  they  were  taking  a  hand.  The 
English  professional  soldier,  the  officer,  that  is  to  say, 
makes  it  almost  a  point  of  honour  not  to  talk  about 
his  battles  first  or  last.  But  the  southern  gentlemen 
farmers  and  lawyers,  as  well  as  the  host  of  more 
rustic  persons,  who  were  all  rushed  headlong  into  a 
big  battle  from  a  life  inconceivably  remote  from  all 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  283 

wars  or  echoes  of  wars,  however  hardened  they  after- 
wards became,  never  forgot  those  first  impressions, 
and  seldom  tired  of  reverting  to  them.  Both  Edge- 
hill  and  Bull  Run  were  battles  between  amateurs, 
representing  something  the  same  divergent  qualities. 
The  result  of  the  one,  to  be  sure,  was  facilitated  by  a 
panic,  while  the  other  in  a  fashion  v\^as  fought  out. 
But  that  is  a  detail  :  nor  is  it  of  much  consequence 
that  the  English  gentry  of  that  day  were  trained  to 
the  sword  and  warhorse  as  part  of  their  education, 
whereas  the  southern  planter's  equipment  was  that 
rather  of  a  well-to-do  English  farmer.  He  could  ride 
and  was  familiar  with,  though  not  generally  dexterous 
in,  the  use  of  fire-arms,  and  he  never  became  a  swords- 
man. How  should  he  ?  The  swords  of  one  well- 
known  southern  cavalry  regiment,  several  of  whom 
I  knew  well  in  after  days,  including  their  colonel, 
were  never  even  ground  ! 

Rupert  was  on  the  top  of  the  hill  with  his  cavalry, 
says  Clarendon,  early  in  the  morning  and  gave  the 
first  intimation  to  Essex  that  a  battle  was  inevitable, 
but  many  of  their  regiments  were  so  far  back  that 
it  was  one  o'clock  when  the  Royal  army  descended 
into  the  plain,  and  three  before  the  armies  engaged. 
The  sympathies  of  the  country  people  in  this  part 
were  strongly  with  the  Parliament,  though  Clarendon 
attributes  this  to  the  reports  industriously  circulated 
of  the  ferocity  and  licentiousness  of  the  Cavaliers,  for 
which  at  present  there  was  no  grounds,  everything 
being  studiously  paid  for.  Later  on,  when  "  war  had 
to  support  war ",  the  terror  with  which  either  side 
were  regarded  left  a  little,  to  be  sure,  but  not  much, 
to  choose  between  them. 

Essex  disposed  his  line  of  battle  about  a  mile  and 
a  quarter  on  the  hither  side  of  Kineton,  his  left  just 


284  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

crossing  the  Banbury  road,  along  which  we  shall 
return  in  this  chapter  to  Stratford.  The  Royal  army 
being  the  larger  overlapped  him  by  a  little — the  flanks 
of  both  upon  the  other  or  south-western  extremity  of 
the  field  resting  on  a  small  brook  that  runs  parallel 
to  the  second  main  road  from  Edgehill  to  Kineton, 
which  is  the  Banbury  road  from  Stratford.  It  would 
be  quite  accurate  enough  for  the  visitor  to  picture 
both  armies  facing  each  other  midway  between  the 
hill  and  Kineton,  and  just  filling  the  space  between  the 
two  main  roads,  each  with  a  frontage  of  something 
over  a  mile. 

The  king,  arrayed  in  armour  overlaid  with  a  mantle 
of  black  velvet,  rode  along  the  lines  and  addressed  his 
men,  after  which  the  battle  opened  with  the  usual 
artillery  duel  of  that  and  later  days.  There  was  not 
much  more  than  two  hours  of  daylight  left,  and  the 
King's  Horse,  both  on  the  right,  under  Prince  Rupert, 
and  on  the  left,  under  Wilmot,  proceeded  to  charge  the 
enemy.  Rupert  had  almost  immediate  success,  riding 
down  with  ease  the  raw  troopers  who  had  scarcely 
learned  as  yet  to  sit  a  horse  or  fire  a  pistol,  much  less 
wield  a  sword.  Wilmot,  after  a  little  more  resistance, 
was  equally  successful,  and  the  discomfited  cavalry, 
breaking  the  ranks  behind  them,  carried  most  of  them 
away  in  headlong  flight.  The  desertion,  too,  at  the 
opening  of  the  first  charge  of  the  inappropriately 
named  Sir  Faithful  Fortescue,  with  his  regiment  from 
the  Parliamentary  ranks,  increased  the  dismay  of  their 
horse  and  such  infantry  as  they  carried  with  them. 
The  impetuous  and  reckless  Rupert  had  his  eye  alone 
on  the  baggage  carts  of  the  enemy,  drawn  up  in  tempt- 
ing fashion  in  the  village  of  Kineton,  and  his  victorious 
horsemen  fell  to  plundering  as  if  the  battle  were  over. 
This  was  very  far  indeed  from  being  the  case,  for  with 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  285 

scarcely  any  cavalry  left  to  oppose  him,  Essex  sent  his 
reserve  of  horse  right  through  his  enemy's  line  and, 
backed  by  the  officers  of  the  broken  regiments  who 
had  all  scorned  to  fly,  and  the  infantry  of  his  centre, 
attacked  the  King's  Foot  with  impetuosity  and  success. 
The  king  behaved  with  great  courage,  riding  back  and 
forth  amid  the  ranks,  encouraging  his  men,  who  were 
being  hardly  pressed,  as  the  cream  of  his  army  was  of 
course  his  cavalry,  and  he  was,  moreover,  being  attacked 
both  in  front  and  on  the  flanks.  Lindsay,  his  chief  in 
command,  was  cut  down  and  borne  dying  from  the 
field  by  Essex's  men.  Sir  Edmund  Verney,  his  standard- 
bearer,  was  killed  and  the  flag  itself  captured,  to  be 
regained,  however,  by  a  clever  ruse  of  a  Royalist  captain, 
who,  donning  an  orange  scarf,  the  badge  of  the  Parlia- 
mentary cavalry,  rode  up  to  Essex's  secretary,  who  was 
carrying  it,  and  took  it  from  his  hand  with  the  remark 
that  it  was  not  fit  for  a  penman  to  have  the  honour  of 
bearing  that  standard. 

When  Rupert  and  the  officers  of  the  Royalist 
cavalry,  with  the  portions  of  their  regiments,  broken 
not  by  defeat  but  by  a  too  easy  victory  and  undisciplined 
exuberance,  checked  in  their  plundering  at  Kineton  by 
the  arrival  of  Hampden  with  his  three  fresh  regiments, 
returned,  they  found  the  king  in  no  little  danger, 
even  to  his  own  person,  from  the  unbroken  squadrons 
and  infantry  regiments  of  Essex  which  held  that  part 
of  the  field.  When  the  Royalist  cavalry,  however, 
got  back  to  their  lines  they  found  their  friends  thrust 
back  to  the  very  foot  of  Edgehill,  before  which  they 
were  fighting  for  their  lives  and  hardly  pressed.  "  I 
can  give  a  good  account  of  the  enemy's  horse",  said 
Rupert  on  seeing  the  critical  situation  of  the  rest  of 
the  king's  army  in  consequence  of  his  reckless  tactics. 
"  Ay  ",  said  an  officer,  with  an  oath,  "  and  of  their 


286  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

carts  too  ".  As  to  the  Royalist  cavalry,  though  they 
had  for  the  most  part  returned,  they  could  not  be 
persuaded,  says  Clarendon,  to  advance  again  upon 
the  enemy,  from  the  fact  that  the  broken  regiments 
had  got  so  hopelessly  intermingled,  that  officers  who 
were  ready  to  renew  the  charge  could  not  find  their 
men,  or  the  men  in  like  heart  could  not  find  their 
officers.  A  disciplined  army  even  in  such  case  might 
have  soon  found  leaders  and  men,  but  as  Clarendon, 
with  all  the  authority  of  a  contemporary  who  knew 
the  men  and  must  have  talked  to  scores  of  them,  un- 
mistakably showSjiboth  sides  as  amateurswere  staggered 
by  the  very  considerable  slaughter.  Shaken  and  be- 
wildered no  doubt  by  so  sanguinary  a  first  experience, 
they  showed  no  desire  to  join  issue  again.  The  rapidly 
fading  daylight,  moreover,  for  it  was  now  half-past  five, 
as  much  perhaps  as  lack  of  inclination,  settled  the 
matter.  To  quote  again  this  great  writer  and  delight- 
ful stylist,  though  in  details  by  no  means  infallible  : 
"  In  the  doubt  of  all  sides,  night,  the  common  friend 
to  wearied  and  dismayed  armies,  parted  them."  The 
actual  number  of  those  killed  and  buried  on  both 
sides,  though  estimated  by  Clarendon  at  5000,  seems 
actually  to  have  been  under  2000,  a  loss  severe  enough 
for  a  two-hours'  engagement  of  probably  not  much 
over  30,000  actual  combatants.  Under  modern  pro- 
portions the  wounded  would  almost  have  equalled  the 
whole  of  the  remainder  of  both  armies.  But  the 
wounded  of  those  days,  the  badly  wounded  at  least, 
were  fortunately  for  themselves  a  trifling  minority, 
whose  situation  one  shudders  to  contemplate.  Among 
them  was  the  Earl  of  Lindsay,  titular  commander  of 
the  king's  forces.  But  great  men  were  looked  after, 
and  Lindsay  was  taken  by  his  captors  to  die  in  Warwick 
Castle.     Both  armies  spent  the  night  on  and  near  the 


TO  COMPTON  WINYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  287 

battlefield  in  unalleviated  misery — for  there  was  an 
exceptionally  hard  frost  and  neither  shelter  nor 
comfort — in  expectation  of  renewed  hostilities  in  the 
morning.  But  the  armies  faced  each  other  for  most 
of  the  next  day  without  venturing  on  the  offensive. 
Both  had  some  politic  reasons  for  their  inaction,  but 
to  these  were  undoubtedly  added  the  reaction  natural 
to  a  first  sanguinary  battle  between  citizen  soldiers 
of  the  same  nation  who  had  not  yet  acquired  the 
rancorous  hostility  that  a  protracted  warfare  engenders. 
Moreover,  reconciliation  was  not  yet  abandoned.  The 
king  indeed  sent  an  envoy  to  Essex,  who  was  extremely 
curt  with  him.  Sir  William  le  Neve,  Clarencieux 
King-at-arms,  was  the  negotiator  instructed  to  offer 
pardon  to  all  who  would  lay  down  their  arms,  though 
his  mission  was  as  much  perhaps  to  take  stock  of  the 
enemy  and  their  condition.  This  motive  seemed  the 
more  probable  one,  and  Essex,  who  took  the  precau- 
tions usual  in  such  cases,  was  in  so  truculent  a  mood 
that  the  Royal  envoy  entirely  overlooked  this  object 
of  his  expedition  and  had  little  or  nothing  to  report 
upon  it  when  he  returned  to  camp.  Ultimately  both 
armies  retired,  Charles  in  leisurely  fashion  towards 
London,  which  it  will  be  remembered  he  nearly  reached, 
and  his  enemies  to  Warwick. 

There  are  many  incidents  and  anecdotes  told  of 
this  famous  battle,  that  one  is  glad  to  recall  or  hear 
of  with  the  whole  field  spread  out  immediately  at  one's 
feet.  Near  Radway  old  church,  for  instance,  abandoned 
within  easy  memory  for  the  new  one  near  by  and 
standing  just  behind  the  king's  line  of  battle,  Charles 
himself  took  up  his  position.  His  two  sons,  then  ten 
and  twelve  years  old,  under  the  protection  of  the 
King's  physician.  Dr.  Harvey,  of  blood  -  circulation 
fame,  were  placed  on  the  heights  of  Knowle  End,  the 


288  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

extremity  of  Edgehill  and  just  above  and  behind  the 
right  of  the  Royal  position.  It  is  said  that  the  absent- 
minded  medico  was  so  intent  on  his  studies  while  the 
fight  was  raging  that  several  bullets  had  sung  about 
the  ears  of  himself  and  his  charges  before  they  shifted 
their  position.  They  must  have  been  sitting  in  fact 
just  over  that  portion  of  the  steep  still  known  as  Bullet 
Hill  from  the  hot  fire  that  the  Parliamentary  regiments, 
after  pushing  their  opponents  back  that  far,  poured 
into  it.  Charles  spent  the  night  of  the  battle  in  a 
barn  just  below,  and  his  route  from  thence  back  to 
the  hill-top  is  known  as  King  Charles's  Road. 

In  Radway  Church,  removed  from  the  old  one,  is 
the  mutilated  effigy  of  Captain  Henry  Kingsmill,  the 
second  son  of  a  Hampshire  knight  who  was  killed,  so 
a  tradition  has  it,  because  his  white  horse  offered  such 
a  tempting  mark  to  the  Parliamentary  gunners.  The 
monument  was  erected  by  his  widowed  mother  nearly 
thirty  years  after  his  death.  Two  homesteads,  known 
as  Thistle  Farm  and  Battle  Farm,  mark  with  sufficient 
accuracy  the  front  of  Lord  Essex's  line,  where  it  should 
not  be  forgotten  was  Oliver  Cromwell,  then  a  captain 
of  horse.  Just  in  front  of  these  is  a  larch  coppice 
called  "The  Little  Grave  Ground",  where  several 
hundred  of  the  dead  were  buried.  In  an  adjoining 
field  is  "  The  Great  Grave  Mound  ",  marked  by  a  wych 
elm  where  still  larger  numbers  of  corpses  are  said 
to  have  been  interred.  Right  through  the  old  battle- 
field from  these  farms  to  the  hill,  which  it  ascends  near 
the  tower,  is  King  John's  or  the  Welsh  Lane.  The 
latter  term  has  no  reference  to  the  Welsh  levies  which 
fought  on  the  king's  side,  but  is  merely  one  of  those 
numerous  by-ways  in  the  Midlands  that  were  used  by 
their  drovers  as  they  brought  their  black  cattle  and 
ponies  to  the  great  English  fairs. 


TO  COMPTON  WLNYATES  AND  EDGEHILL  289 

Never  was  a  battle  thrown  away  with  more  mon- 
strous folly  than  this  one  by  Rupert,  who  with  char- 
acteristic arrogance  refused  to  take  orders  from  any 
one  but  the  king  himself.  He  had  also  an  overweening 
contempt,  till  cime  cured  it,  of  the  citizen  soldiers  of 
the  Commonwealth.  Again  and  again  this  lack  of  judg- 
ment cost  the  king,  who  always  listened  to  him,  dear. 
Few  would  have  imagined  that  the  awkward  troopers 
who  fled  through  Kineton  at  the  very  sight  almost  of 
Rupert's  charging  squadrons  would  in  four  years' 
time,  under  an  obscure  captain  of  horse,  be  wirning 
battles  by  the  very  terror  of  their  name. 

Kineton  is  a  pleasant,  old-fashioned  looking  village 
or  diminutive  town.  Most  of  its  church  save  the  tower 
has  been  rebuilt  in  recent  times,  and  no  particular 
distinction  now  belongs  to  the  place,  unless  the  posses- 
sion of  the  kennels  of  the  South  Warwickshire  Hunt 
may  be  accounted  as  one.  Proceeding  thence,  however, 
on  the  road  to  Stratford,  one  passes  in  a  mile  or  so, 
beneath  a  dense  and  stately  avenue  of  elms,  and  almost 
immediately  afterwards  traverses  the  highly  ornate 
demesne  of  wood  and  water  amid  which,  within  easy 
view,  stands  the  Georgian  mansion,  successor  to  a 
former  one,  of  the  Verneys  of  Compton  Verney.  A 
large  sheet  of  ornamental  water,  contracted  in  the 
middle  in  hour-glass  fashion,  is  there  crossed  by  our 
road.  What  with  the  fine  timber,  the  undulating 
parkland,  the  glistening  stretches  of  water,  and  the 
decorative  aspect  of  the  bordering  hedgerows,  the 
traveller  on  the  highway  might  almost  fancy  he  had 
taken  a  wrong  turn,  and  was  heading  for  the  front  door 
of  the  large  porticoed  mansion  of  that  complexion 
which  seems  to  exude  Georgian  figures,  and  on  a  smaller 
scale  was  copied  so  much  in  the  American  colonies. 
The  Verneys,  of  whom  Lord  Willoughby  de  Broke  is 


290  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

the  head,  have  been  here  since  1442,  and  the  house, 
which  was  pulled  down  to  make  room  for  the  present 
one,  must  have  been  interesting,  as  it  was  built  by 
the  first  of  the  family.  After  leaving  Compton  Verney 
one  passes  the  lodge  gates  of  Watton  Hall  of  the 
Mordaunts,  another  famous  Warwickshire  family  seated 
here  since  the  time  of  Henry  VIH.  This  house  is  quite 
modern,  but  as  it  stands  a  mile  from  the  lodge  at  the 
farther  end  of  a  noble  avenue  reaching  the  whole  of 
that  distance,  its  architecture  is  of  not  much  conse- 
quence to  the  passer-by.  Soon  afterwards  the  Strat- 
ford road  traverses  the  village  of  Wellesbourne 
Hastings,  and  thence  emerges  into  the  Avon  valley 
and  to  scenes  concerning  which  something  will  have 
to  be  said  in  the  next  chapter. 


I 


CHAPTER  X 
STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK 

THE  direct  road  from  Stratford  to  Warwick 
follows  the  west  bank  of  the  Avon  and  covers 
about  eight  miles.  On  the  other  bank  a  slightly 
longer  route  proceeds  thither  by  way  of  Charlecote, 
Hampton  Lucy  (by  a  slight  deviation),  and  Barford. 
The  latter  runs  over  a  practically  flat  country,  at- 
tractive mainly  for  the  associations  attaching  to  the 
villages  along  it.  The  former  for  much  of  the  way 
waves  up  and  down  the  brink  of  a  high  ridge,  and  has  in 
a  marked  degree  those  attributes  of  stately  timber  and 
general  atmosphere  of  accompanying  verdure  of  grass 
and  leaf  that  distinguishes  the  Midland  highway.  Few 
genuine  country  roads  in  England  outside  the  London 
orbit,  I  should  imagine,  are  more  persistently  travelled, 
with  all  that  is  nowadays  implied  thereby.  Possibly 
before  these  pages  are  in  print  it  will  have  achieved 
the  aim  to  which  most  roads  seem  to  be  tending,  to 
wit,  a  face  of  tar.  Materially  this  will  beyond  question 
ameliorate  the  lot  of  the  average  traveller  between 
the  two  towns.  For  myself  I  hold,  in  common  no 
doubt  with  innumerable  others,  that  hitherto  the 
chief  landscape  glory  of  the  shires  of  Warwick  and 
Northampton  has  lain  in  their  delightful  turf- 
bordered,  elm-shaded  highways.  Nor  is  the  least 
essential  part  of  their  pleasing  effect  the  firm,  white, 
dry  road,  itself  forging    onward    in   graceful  curves, 


292  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

sometimes  opening  a  new  vista  every  hundred  yards, 
or  again  pressing  forward  between  some  long-drawn 
half-mile  avenue,  in  gently  waving  undulations, 
narrowing  in  the  distance  to  a  ribbon's  breadth,  and 
always  in  most  effective  contrast  to  the  verdure  on 
which  its  sharp  outlines  lie.  How  this  will  be  when 
the  roads  are  equipped  with  a  surface  of  tar,  I  do  not 
know  !  The  Midlander  of  sensibility  would  probably 
have  a  good  deal  to  say  on  the  matter,  though  that  is 
of  really  no  importance,  as  nothing  he  could  say  is 
likely  to  make  the  faintest  difference,  dust  or  tar 
being  apparently  the  alternatives.  To  those  of  us, 
and  they  must  be  legion,  who  feel  the  sentiment  and 
the  charm  of  hedgerow  and  timber,  such  as  gathers 
round  a  rural  English  highway,  a  road  of  tar,  assailing 
simultaneously  both  eyes  and  nose  and  impregnating 
the  haunts  of  peace  with  the  ceaseless  suggestion  of  a 
city  gasworks,  is  not  inviting. 

However  alluring  a  stretch  of  Midland  highway,  as 
that  from  Stratford  to  Warwick  still  is  when  traffic 
has  vanished  and  the  autumn  tints  of  late  October 
or  early  November  are  in  full  display,  there  are  plenty 
of  lanes  and  byways  or  field  paths  through  which 
the  leisurely  pilgrim  may  still  thread  his  way  in  peace. 
Many  of  the  spots  worthy  of  his  notice  are  just  off 
the  track,  while  the  roads  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
the  Avon  on  its  east  bank  are  in  any  case  less  fearsome 
in  the  pursuit  than  those  upon  the  west. 

One  might  wander  here  far  afield  with  the  licence 
I  indulged  in  during  the  last  chapter.  But  I  do  not 
think  that  Henley-in-Arden,  in  spite  of  its  romantic 
name,  its  peaceful  tree-bordered  street,  its  moderate 
store  of  old  houses,  and  very  interesting  church  of 
Beaudesert  is  worth  another  such  violent  departure. 
Even  though  one  may  take  the  striking  and  beauti- 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  293 

fully  placed  church  of  Wootton  Wawen,  where,  as 
related,  William  Somerville,  the  sportsman  poet,  among 
other  worthies,  lies  buried,  en  route.  In  regard  to 
such  places  as  lie  about  the  Avon  and  more  nearly 
concern  us,  Shottery,  a  much  modernized  village,  but 
boasting  the  world-famous  cottage  of  Ann  Hathaway, 
nothing  more  need  be  said  except  that  besides  its 
reputed  association  it  is  an  excellent  specimen  of  a 
sixteenth  century  house  of  its  class,  and  does  admirable 
service  to  thousands  of  persons  from  overseas  and 
the  fringes  of  Britain  who  may  have  only  this  oppor- 
tunity of  seeing  one  in  their  lives. 

Clopton,  too,  the  old  seat  of  the  Clopton  family  so 
frequently  alluded  to  in  these  pages,  lies  on  high  ground 
just  to  the  north  of  Stratford.  The  house  has  been 
almost  entirely  rebuilt  ;  the  site  and  the  associations 
of  a  place  where  Shakespeare  was  probably  a  frequent 
visitor  being  all  that  remain.  The  Cloptons,  who  as 
local  landowners  date  far  back  into  the  Middle  Ages, 
became  prominent  in  a  lord  mayor  of  the  late  fifteenth 
century  who  built  the  bridge  at  Stratford  now  bearing 
his  name.  This  celebrity,  to  whom  there  is  an  altar 
tomb  in  Stratford  Church,  was  the  last  of  the  race. 
The  name,  however,  was  revived  by  another  family  in 
the  time  of  Henry  VIII,  and  it  was  these  Cloptons,  of 
course,  who  were  Shakespeare's  neighbours  and  the 
owners  of  New  Place  both  before  and  after  the  poet's 
occupation  of  it.  There  is  a  dubious  legend  concern- 
ing the  two  daughters  of  the  House  of  Clopton. 
One  of  them  is  supposed  to  have  been  buried  alive 
during  the  plague  in  1564,  and  the  other  to  have 
drowned  herself  in  a  pond  behind  the  house  from 
disappointed  love.  Those  with  a  facility  for  identify- 
ing Shakespearean  scenes  and  characters  with  the 
poet's  actual  environment,  see  Clopton  House  in  the 


294  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARFS  COUNTRY 

second  scene  of  the  "  Taming  of  the  Shrew  ",  and  the 
two  hapless  young  women  themselves  in  the  plays  of 
"  Romeo  and  Juliet"  and  "  Hamlet"  respectively. 
But  much  more  interesting  than  dubious  stories  of 
undistinguished  young  women  and  guesswork  concern- 
ing Shakespeare's  characters  is  the  fact  that  Clopton 
was  rented  during  the  months  prior  to  the  Gunpowder 
Plot  by  young  Ambrose  Rookwood  for  its  advantages 
of\ontiguity  to  the  rest  of  the  conspirators.  It  must 
be  remembered  that  Worcestershire  and  this  corner  of 
Warwickshire  was  a  perfect  nest  of  Roman  Catholic 
families.  It  was  among  these  in  great  measure  that 
the  active  members  of  this  momentous  plot  were 
recruited,  while  outside  this  inner  circle  the  small 
public  who  knew  that  some  crisis  was  impending,  but 
nothing  of  its  nature,  and  awaited  the  event  with 
hushed  sympathetic  expectation,  were  chiefly  repre- 
sented by  the  Catholic  aristocracy  of  Worcestershire. 

Few  people  nowadays  know  anything  of  the  Gun- 
powder Plot.  It  is  vaguely  remembered  as  the  mad 
impossible  scheme  of  a  few  half-deranged  fanatics. 
The  decline  of  Guy  Fawkes  in  efhgy  to  the  mean, 
ineffectual  scarecrow  generally  paraded  to-day  by 
a  mere  residue  of  copper-hunting  village  urchins, 
insensibly  perhaps  helps  to  fix  this  impression.  Almost 
forgotten  is  the  hair-breadth  escape  this  was,  and 
what  the  result  would  have  been  had  those  thirty-six 
barrels  of  powder  exploded  beneath  the  feet  of  King, 
Lords,  and  Commons.  It  was  only  the  belated  im- 
pulse on  the  part  of  a  single  member  at  the  last 
moment  to  save  a  particular  individual  that  averted 
a  catastrophe,  the  effect  of  which  staggers  the  imagina- 
tion. The  Guy  Fawkes  of  conventional  fancy  is  a 
middle-aged  plebeian  ruffian.  The  Guido  Fawkes 
of  fact  was  a  young  man  of  parts  and  exceptional 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  295 

social  qualities.  All  the  conspirators  save  Percy  were 
about  or  under  thirty  years  of  age.  They  were 
mostly  connected  by  blood,  and  in  turn  allied  to  all 
the  Catholic  families  of  this  part  of  England. 

Catesby,  the  devisor  and  promoter  of  the  whole 
business,  was  born  on  one  of  the  family  estates  at 
Lapworth  near  Henley-in-Arden,  and  was  cousin  to 
the  Wyntours  of  Huddington,  that  moated  Tudor 
manor  house  still  standing  half-forsaken  about  ten 
miles  north  of  Evesham  and  fifteen  from  Stratford. 
And  of  all  houses  where  these  dark  deeds  were  mooted, 
.between  brothers  and  cousins  of  otherwise  upright 
life  and  many  virtues,  Huddington  was  the  most 
frequented  by  them.  Catesby  was  just  over  thirty, 
a  widower,  tall  and  handsome.  Wild  in  youth,  he 
had  for  some  time  abandoned  frivolities  and  devoted 
himself  and  his  means  to  alleviating  the  hardships 
which  the  increasing  stringency  of  the  penal  laws 
inflicted  on  the  more  unfortunate  of  his  own  faith. 
He  held  the  opinion  that  the  ruin  of  the  Catholic 
families  through  increasing  fines  was  inevitable, 
and  that  even  the  most  desperate  alternative  was 
worth  the  risk.  King  James  was  a  special  object 
of  hostility,  as  he  had  secured  the  Catholic  support 
when  claimant  for  the  English  throne  by  definite 
promises  of  liberal  treatment  which  he  had  more 
than  broken.  Catesby  was  a  man  of  extraordinary 
magnetism,  though  of  little  eloquence,  and  won 
over  friend  after  friend  who  heard  the  details  of  his 
scheme  for  the  first  time  with  horror.  The  younger 
Wyntour  of  Huddington,  a  brave  soldierly  man  of 
the  world,  was  his  first  convert  and  most  effective 
ally.  The  elder  and  squire,  a  well-meaning,  peace- 
able, weakish,  family  man,  was  among  the  pathetic 
instances   of   members   of   the   inner    ring  who  were 


296  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARKS  COUNTRY 

drawn  into  it  against  their  will  and  better  judgment, 
only  to  die  a  dreadful  death.  It  is  an  intricate  and 
thrilling  story,  too  good  perhaps  to  spoil  by  com- 
pression, too  long  to  treat  of  here  effectively. 

The  two  Wrights  were  cousins  of  the  Wyntours. 
Grant  of  Northbrook,  the  site  of  which  house  lies 
farther  on  nearer  the  Warwick  road,  was  a  brother-in- 
law.  The  Lyttletons  of  Hagley  and  Holbeach,  who 
were  involved,  were  also  cousins.  In  the  same  circle 
of  affinities,  too,  were  the  Habingtons  of  Hindlip, 
and  the  Talbots  of  Grafton,  which  last  mansion  is 
still  in  great  part  standing  and  occupied.  Both  kept 
out  of  the  plot,  but  the  Squire  of  Hindlip  gavesanctuary 
in  his  huge,  rambling  rabbit-warren  of  a  house  to 
certain  priests  and  other  humbler  men  more  deeply 
implicated,  and  was  condemned  to  death,  but  at  the 
last  moment  reprieved  on  condition  of  confining  his 
movements  to  his  native  county  for  the  rest  of  his 
life.  This  happily  extended  to  forty  years,  during 
which  the  excellent  man  collected  the  materials  for 
a  history  of  Worcestershire,  which  were  simply  in- 
valuable to  the  Rev.  Treadway  Nash,  whose  two- 
volumed  chronicle,  published  in  the  next  century,  is  a 
local  classic. 

Young  Ambrose  Rookwood,  who  domiciled  himself 
here  at  Clopton  for  the  time,  placed  his  famous  stud 
of  horses  at  the  disposal  of  the  conspiracy,  so  did 
another  wealthy  young  Catholic,  Everard  Digby  of 
Norfolk,  who  joined  the  inner  circle  and  occupied 
Coughton  Hall,  the  seat  of  the  Throckmortons,  a  few 
miles  to  the  northward,  for  the  critical  period  of  the 
undertaking.  Here  the  two  priests  chiefly  impli- 
cated, though  probably  not  aware,  like  many  of  the 
outer  ring,  of  the  wholesale  murderous  intention  of 
the  scheme,  Greenway  and  Garnet,  with  Mrs.  Brooksby 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  297 

and    the    daughters   of   Lord   Vaux    of    Harrowden, 
awaited  the  news  which  was  brought  them  by  Bates, 
Catesby's  servant,  in  a  letter  from  Digby. 

On  the  3rd  of  November,  the  night  which  witnessed 
the  arrest  of  Fawkes  actually  among  his  powder 
barrels,  the  plot  had  been  hatched  or  hatching  for  a 
year.  One  after  another  members  of  the  large  West 
Midland  Catholic  clan  and  their  friends  had  been 
drawn,  some  almost  forced,  in.  Grant  of  Northbrook 
was  probably  over-persuaded,  and  but  half-willingly 
committed  to  the  terrible  enterprise  with  its  pro- 
digious risks.  But  once  committed  there  was  no 
turning,  no  via  media,  and  nothing  for  it  but  to  go 
through  to  the  bitter  end.  Wonderful  sang-froid 
was  exhibited  by  some  of  the  leaders  and  promoters 
during  the  months  when  Fawkes,  Thomas  Wyntour, 
the  Wrights,  Percy,  and  Catesby  were  slowly,  with 
closed  doors  and  windows,  working  their  way  through 
the  foundation  walls  of  the  empty  house  in  West- 
minster before  the  more  convenient  coal  cellar  became 
by  an  accident  available.  Catesby,  for  instance, 
went  to  Bath  to  drink  the  waters,  while  there  were 
constant  gatherings  at  Huddington,  Clopton,  and 
Northbrook. 

The  great  hunt  meeting  had  been  arranged  for  the 
fifth  on  Dunsmuir  Heath,  towards  Rugby,  where  the 
initiated  and  the  half-initiated  were  to  await  messengers 
from  London  hurrying  by  relays  of  horses  with  the 
result  of  the  plot.  At  Catholic  houses  like  Grafton, 
parties  were  gathered  for  the  tryst,  mostly  persons 
not  yet  implicated  and  without  any  clear  idea  of 
what  portended.  At  the  inns  in  Rugby  too,  other 
expectant  souls  were  forgathered,  no  man  being 
sure  of  how  much  his  fellow  knew.  But  we  know 
what  manner  of  news  it  was  that  came  at  headlong 


298  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

speed  over  the  muddy  roads  from  London  in  the  dark 
hours  of  that  November  night  and  morning,  and  how 
the  half-formed  hunt  meeting  melted  like  snow  before 
the  bomb  that  fell  among  them,  every  man  to  take 
such  steps  as  the  measure  of  his  guilt  or  innocence 
prompted.  It  is  fortunate  we  have  every  detail  of 
the  drama  preserved  to  us  by  the  mouths  of  some 
five  hundred  witnesses  who  were  examined  in  con- 
nection with  it.  The  most  stirring  feature  of  it  was  the 
ride  for  life  through  the  deep  wintry  roads  of  Warwick 
and  Worcestershire  by  the  score  or  so  of  men,  gentle- 
men, and  servants  who  knew  they  were  doomed, 
with  the  sheriff  and  his  horsemen  at  their  heels.  At 
Warwick,  Catesby  seized  the  entire  stock  of  a  horse- 
dealer  in  place  of  their  own  exhausted  animals.  The 
elder  Wyntour  demurred,  urging  that  such  high- 
handed measures  might  diminish  what  chance  of 
pardon  there  might  yet  exist  for  some  of  them.  "What ! 
hast  thou  any  hope,  Robin  ?  "  was  the  cynical  and, 
under  the  circumstances,  unfeeling  answer.  "  I  assure 
thee  there  is  none  that  knoweth  of  this  action  but 
shall  perish  ".  Riding  on  to  Grant's  house  at  North- 
brook,  where  arms  had  been  stored,  they  provided 
themselves  to  the  full  so  far  as  arms  could  serve  them, 
and,  refreshed  by  a  hurried  meal,  splashed  on  through 
clay  roads,  miry  and  water-logged  by  continuous 
rains,  to  central  Worcestershire,  leaving  the  distracted 
inmates  of  both  Clopton  and  Coughton  on  the  left  to 
hug  their  fears  and  await  the  worst. 

Tired,  wet,  and  hungry,  the  fugitives  arrived  at 
Huddington  by  evening.  Lady  Wyntour,  says  local 
tradition,  had  been  sitting  all  day  in  the  upper  window 
at  the  gable  end  (still  there),  waiting  for  a  horseman 
from  London  to  top  the  near  ridge,  and,  by  precon- 
certed signal  with  his  hat,  to  intimate  the  nature  of 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  299 

the  fateful  news  he  bore.  But  the  hunted  men 
brought  their  own  tale  too  surely  with  them.  The 
little  Tudor  manor  house,  though  virtually  perfect,  is 
now  the  decadent-looking  abode  of  a  farm  labourer's 
family.  The  dining-room  is  still  intact  where  the 
always  hospitable  board  was  hastily  spread,  and  for 
the  last  time  in  the  annals  of  a  long-descended  and 
conspicuous  family.  There  were  no  formalities,  we 
may  be  sure,  and  little  gaiety  in  that  grim,  mud-stained 
band  as  they  snatched  their  hasty  meal,  nor  any 
pother  about  clean  sheets  as  they  flung  themselves 
down,  so  we  are  told,  for  a  brief  sleep.  Time  was 
snatched,  however,  for  the  celebration  of  the  Holy 
Communion,  which  was  administered  in  the  room 
above  by  Father  Hart.  Pressing  on  again,  the  fugi- 
tives headed  for  Wales,  with  vague  hopes  of  escaping 
through  its  mountains  to  the  sea  coast,  four  riding  in 
front  and  four  behind  to  ensure  against  desertion. 

Lord  Windsor's  house  at  Tardebig  was  their  next 
halting-place,  and  here  the  country  people  gathered 
about  them  in  menacing  fashion,  shouting,  "  God  save 
the  king  and  country".  "  We,  too,  are  for  the  country", 
replied  the  fugitives,  "  but  not  for  the  king  ",  Thence, 
with  Sir  Richard  Walsh,  Sheriff  of  Worcestershire, 
who  had  taken  up  the  running,  at  their  heels,  they 
pushed  on  through  north  Worcestershire  by  Burgot, 
Clent,  and  Hagley,  crossed  the  swollen  fords  of  the 
Stour,  and  reached  Stephen  Lyttleton's  manor  of 
Holbeach  at  midnight.  Many  desertions  had  taken 
place  in  the  last  stage,  among  them  Ambrose  Rook- 
wood,  Stephen  Lyttleton,  and  Robert  Wyntour,  but 
to  small  purpose  for  the  deserters.  At  Holbeach  the 
survivors  decided  that  there  was  nothing  for  it  now 
but  to  sell  their  lives  as  dearly  as  possible.  And 
when  the  sheriff,  with  a  sufficient  force,  surrounded  the 


300  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

house  in  the  early  morning,  this,  according  to  the 
evidence  of  Thomas  Wyntour,  is  how  they  did  it. 
"  '  Stand  by  me,  Tom,'  said  Catesby,  as  we  went  out 
to  meet  them,  '  and  we  will  die  together.'  So  we 
stood  close  together,  Mr.  Percy,  Mr.  Catesby,  and  myself, 
and  they  two  were  shot,  so  far  as  I  could  see,  with  one 
bullet.  Then  the  company  entered  upon  me,  hurt  me 
in  the  belly  with  a  pick,  and  gave  me  other  wounds, 
until  one  came  behind  me  and  caught  me  in  both 
arms." 

So  ended,  with  the  subsequent  hanging  and 
quartering,  an  apparently  mad  and  obviously  wicked 
enterprise.  Yet  the  catastrophe  was  averted  by  a 
mere  accident,  in  the  belated  anxiety  for  the  life  of 
a  connection  on  the  part  of  Francis  Tresham,  one  of 
the  conspirators,  which  took  the  form  of  a  letter  that 
even  then  might  well  have  passed  unnoticed.  As  to 
the  monstrous  criminality  of  the  proceeding,  one  is 
forced  to  remember  that  all  the  potential  criminals 
were  men  above  the  average  in  respectability,  courage, 
and  morals.  It  is  a  little  singular  too  that,  while 
almost  every  Warwickshire  worthy  who  was  a  mere 
contemporary  of  Shakespeare  is  dragged  into  the 
light  with  small  regard  to  his  qualities  and  not  much 
to  his  distance  from  Stratford,  I  do  not  remember 
to  have  seen  it  ever  noticed  that  the  poet  must  have 
been  almost  rubbing  shoulders  with  gunpowder  plotters 
in  the  hey-day  of  his  local  importance  as  the  owner 
of  the  big  house  of  Stratford  ;  that  the  house,  which 
in  Stratford  literature  is  chiefly  celebrated  as  his 
almost  certain  and  frequent  place  of  call,  was  occupied 
for  part  of  that  time  by  Ambrose  Rookwood  himself 
with  his  long  string  of  horses  which  were  pressed  into 
the  service  of  the  memorable  tragedy. 

Welcombe  Lodge  is  another  place  of  note,  standing 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  301 

pleasantly  between  hills  above  the  Warwick  road. 
The  house  itself,  the  property  of  that  distinguished 
Northumbrian  and  gifted  writer,  Sir  George  Trevelyan, 
is  new,  but  it  covers  the  site  of  an  older  one,  wherein 
abode  William  Combe,  the  nephew  of  John  Combe  and 
a  friend  of  Shakespeare's.  Upon  the  hill  above  is 
a  conspicuous  obelisk  to  the  builder  of  the  present 
house, who  was  a  gentleman  of  worth  and  some  political 
distinction. 

Sometimes  the  now  disappearing  fashion  of  placing 
lofty  monuments  on  hill-tops  to  departed  relatives  or 
local  worthies  touches  succeeding  generations  with  a 
sense  of  flamboyant  incongruity,  which  is  the  more 
painful  since  the  object  is  irremovable.  In  a  parish 
known  to  me  there  is  a  prodigious  monument  nearly 
80  feet  high,  erected  by  impulsive  filial  piety  to  a 
singularly  undistinguished  if  excellent  country  squire. 
It  is  extraordinarily  unsymmetrical  and  crude  in  appear- 
ance, looming  like  an  overgrown  mine  chimney  on  the 
top  of  a  ridge  over  half  a  picturesque  county.  I  feel 
quite  sure  that  the  grandchildren  of  the  commemorated 
one,  still  seated  within  sight  of  it,  if  only  for  the  things 
that  are  said  by  frank  and  incautious  visitors,  would 
in  their  heart  of  hearts  feel  thankful  to  any  one  who 
would  explode  a  sufficient  charge  of  dynamite  at  its 
base.  The  enthusiastic  lover  of  nature  and  land- 
scape, however,  the  only  possible  ally  they  could  hope 
for,  is  not  usually  on  terms  with  explosives. 

Another  one,  less  portentous  than  this,  but  equally 
conspicuous  on  the  crest  of  a  bare  and  lofty  hill,  though 
comparatively  modern,  has  already  lost  its  local 
connection  which,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  was  never  truly 
of  the  soil,  in  this  case  northern. 

"  Who  is  that  obelisk  to  ?  "  said  a  distinguished 
British  general  to  a  local  acquaintance  of  mine,  who 


302  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

was  driving  him  about  the  country.  On  hearing  that 
it  was  the  tribute  of  a  family,  already  almost  forgotten, 
to  the  glorious  memory  of  a  relative  who  had  taken 
a  prominent  part  in  some  branch  of  the  military  supply 
department  half  a  century  since,  the  great  man's  gall 

rose.     "  What !   that  d d  scoundrel !     Why  !  he'd 

have  been  in  jail  if  he'd  lived  ".  Beyond  doubt  there 
are  obelisks  and  obelisks,  but  even  those  of  the  virtuous 
and  the  brave  are  slightly  arrogant  and  certainly  not 
harmonious  notes  in  a  rural  landscape.  With  a 
reservation  perhaps  in  favour  of  great  national  heroes, 
the  others  might  be  erected  in  unconspicuous  glades, 
where  the  relatives  and  descendants  could  drop  the 
tributary  tear,  if  they  felt  hke  it,  in  comparative 
privacy. 

Snitterfield,  though  in  the  direction  of  Warwick, 
lies  aloof  from  the  dust-deep  highway  thither,  and 
is  a  distinctly  attractive  village  set  upon  the  slope 
of  quite  a  high  ridge.  It  contains  among  much  that 
is  modern  a  good  deal  that  is  old,  for  it  is  of  consider- 
able size,  being,  moreover,  umbrageous  in  the  best 
Warwickshire  style,  and  rich,  not  merely  in  elms  of 
noble  girth  and  height  but  in  oak  and  ash  besides, 
each  in  their  way  of  equal  dignity.  The  flavour  of 
the  place  seems  quite  in  keeping  with  the  fact  that 
many  of  Shakespeare's  relatives  abode  here — his 
grandfather  and  his  uncle,  most  certainly  the  latter, 
since  he  is  recorded  as  paying  a  fine  for  allowing  the 
ditches  on  his  holding,  which  still  bears  the  same  name, 
to  fall  into  disrepair. 

The  church,  a  combination  of  Decorated  and  Per- 
pendicular, is  most  interesting  perhaps  for  the  seven- 
teenth century  woodwork  of  the  pulpit  and  altar  rails. 
Its  vicar  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  was 
Richard  lago,  a  well-known  Warwickshire  poet  of  that 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  303 

day,  who  lies  buried  here,  while  the  vicarage  in  which 
he  wrote  is  a  picturesque  old  gabled  building.  Three 
silver  birch  trees,  planted  on  the  lawn  by  the  poet- 
parson's  daughters,  and  known  as  "  the  three  ladies  ", 
are  features  of  perhaps  too  strictly  local  interest  to  stir 
our  emotions.  But  they  take  rank  as  notable  objects 
and  are  shown  to  the  tourist  in  this  perhaps  slightly  self- 
conscious  corner  of  the  country.  Much  better  than  the 
birch  trees,  however,  is  the  "  King's  Lane  ",  down  which 
the  disguised  Prince  Charles  rode  when  a  fugitive  from 
the  battle  of  Worcester  with  his  preserver,  Miss  Lane, 
seated  behind  him.  This  courageous  lady  was  the 
daughter  of  Colonel  Lane  of  Bentley,  near  Walsall. 
No  question  of  gallantry  or  personal  feeling  entered 
into  this  wonderful  and  romantic  alliance,  one  of 
loyalty  pure  and  simple.  She  was  engaged  at  the  time 
to  Sir  Clement  Fisher  of  Packington  Hall,  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood, whom  in  due  course  she  married. 

From  the  top  of  the  village  and  the  quiet  road  leading 
down  to  the  main  artery,  along  which  the  dust-clouds 
and  the  roar  of  record-breaking  tourists,  and  the  whiz 
of  globe-trotters  whirl  and  throb,  the  outlook  is 
beautiful  and  spacious.  We  have  seen  the  same  view 
more  or  less  from  different  points  ever  since  leaving 
Evesham,  a  glowing,  undulating  plain  at  this  season,  all 
reds  and  browns  and  golds  and  greens.  Our  old  friends 
of  Bredon  and  the  Cotswolds  and  Meon  Hill  are  away 
tothe  right,  while  facing  us  is  the  long  level  wall  of  Edge- 
hill.  In  the  middle  distance,  but  not  so  conspicuous 
between  Stratford  and  Warwick,  twists  and  turns  the 
Avon's  willowy  course.  From  the  point  where  the 
Snitterfield  road  joins  the  Warwick  highway,  there  is 
nothing  worth  recording  unless  it  be  a  second  really 
beautiful  outlook  over  the  Avon  valley  to  the  Oxford- 
shire uplands,  with  a  more  easterly  cast  in  it  than  the 


304  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

other.  This  is  just  before  the  main  road  drops  from  its 
high  ridge  torun  in  dull  fashion  along  theflattothe  high- 
perched  and  distinguished-looking  town  of  Warwick. 

But  it  is  to  the  traveller  who  leaves  Stratford  on 
the  other  side  of  the  river,  bound  for  Charlecote  and 
Hampton  Lucy,  that  the  Avon,  now  no  longer  navi- 
gable for  the  oarsman,  chiefly  reveals  itself.  With  rare 
interludes,  however,  it  is  no  longer  a  stream  so  worthy 
of  your  perseverance  as  in  the  lower  reaches,  though 
most  of  the  places  near  its  banks,  already  mentioned, 
have  some  measure  of  notoriety.  Charlecote,  lying  in 
a  large  level  park  sprinkled  with  fine  elms  and  watered 
both  by  the  Avon  and  its  tributary  the  Wellesbourne 
brook,  which  rises  on  the  battlefield  of  Edgehill,  though 
greatly  altered  and  added  to,  is  still  a  noble  specimen 
of  a  Tudor  house.  It  is  not  open  to  the  public,  but 
the  wayfarer  from  many  lands  loves  to  gaze  on  the 
exterior,  which  indeed  is  worth  a  long  inspection, 
and  to  recall  that  Justice  Shallow,  who  long  ago  intimi- 
dated rural  misdemeanants,  including  Shakespeare  him- 
self, within  its  walls,  or  to  watch  the  deer  that  might 
be  the  lineal  descendants  of  the  very  buck  which  is 
supposed  to  have  had  a  hand  in  shaping  the  Bard  of 
Avon's  destmy.  There  is  a  hitch,  however,  in  the 
practical  certainty  that  there  were  no  deer  at  Charlecote, 
and  that  Shakespeare's  predatory  enterprises,  if  such 
he  made,  were  directed  against  a  herd  at  Fulbroke, 
across  the  river,  formerly  a  Crown  domain  and  contain- 
ing a  castle,  the  stones  from  which,  it  mayberemembered, 
were  hauled  away  for  the  building  of  ComptonWinyates. 
In  extenuation  of  the  Shakespeare  incident  and  the 
poet's  morals,  visitors  are  sometimes  reminded  by  the 
local  and  other  literature  that  deer  -  poaching  was 
an  offence  frequently  committed  even  by  gentlemen. 
This  is,  I  think,  a  slight  inaccuracy. 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  305 

It  is  quite  true  that  in  the  great  forests  and  "  chases  " 
where  large  herds  of  deer  wandered  uncontrolled  over 
the  neighbouring  farms  and  properties  of  other  people, 
as  at  Cranborne  for  instance,  but  were  nevertheless 
sacred  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  deer-hunting  and  the 
consequent  fracas  with  keepers  became  a  favourite 
pastime  of  the  "  younger  son  "  element,  whose  families, 
together  with  those  of  the  farmers,  were  sufferers 
without  redress.  But  the  emparked  and  paled-in 
herds  of  country  squires  were  not,  I  think,  looked  on 
as  fair  subjects  of  slaughter  by  their  neighbour's  sons 
and  nephews.  But  Shakespearean  authorities  are  all 
agreed  that  the  poet,  for  some  reason  or  other,  revenged 
himself  on  Squire  Lucy  by  the  portrayal  of  Justice 
Shallow.  The  Lucys  have  been  a  prodigiously  long 
time  at  Charlecote,  though  shifting  in  this  generation 
and  perhaps  in  others  to  the  distaff  side  in  blood.  For 
the  village  was  granted  by  no  less  remote  a  notability 
than  Simon  de  Montfort  to  one  Walter  de  Charlecote, 
whose  people  may  have  been  conspicuous  for  Heaven 
knows  how  long  before  that.  It  was  he  who  first  took 
that  name  of  Lucy  which  has  been  so  absolute  here, 
and  so  notable  in  a  good  many  other  places  I  could 
recall  without  even  a  reference,  ever  since.  Their 
family  history,  however,  we  will  not  pursue,  but  note 
for  a  moment  the  beautiful  Elizabethan  gate-house 
with  turrets  and  dome-roofs  that  carries  one's  thoughts 
at  once  to  that  other  great  Tudor  house  not  twenty 
miles  away,  near  Droitwich,  which  the  Pakington 
family,  its  builders,  have  only  just  lost. 

Charlecote  was  completed  in  the  year  of  the  great 
Eliza's  accession,  and  the  porch,  it  is  said,  was 
hurriedly  completed  to  do  honour  to  the  State  visit 
she  paid  here.  It  is  to  be  feared  if  the  British  workman 
of  to-day  was  thus  pressed  and  temporarily  deprived 


3o6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of,  say,  two  out  of  his  five  meals  a  day,  his  work  would 
not  endure  for  350  years  !     Like  many  other  famous 
Tudor  houses,  the  mellow  red  brick  of  which  this  one 
is  built  lends  additional  charm  to  the  glorious  mass  of 
gables  and  turrets  which  are  fortunately  among  our 
artist's  illustrations.     It  has  been  more  restored  than 
Compton  Winyates,  and  has  not  the  exceptional  and 
singular  quality  of  snug  and  peaceful  seclusion  from 
the  world  which  there  touches  the  imagination;  but 
Charlecote  stands  out  nobly,  as  it  should  do,  at  the  end 
of  a  magnificent  avenue,  in  the  midst  of  a  green  deer 
park  that  no  plough  has  touched  for  centuries,  and 
where  deer  wander  beneath  trees  that  were  shedding 
their  leaves  no  doubt  when  the  guns  were  thundering 
at  Edgehill  over  yonder.     Though  the  house  is  not 
free  to  strangers  the  park  may  be  driven  through  for 
a  trifling  payment.     The  church,  standing  near  the 
end  of  the  avenue  near  the  roadside,  though  tasteful 
enough,  is  unfortunately  a  new  one  built  on  the  site 
of  an  ancient  predecessor.     Happily  the    old  monu- 
ments are  intact,  and  on  this  account,  for  those  who 
like  the  society  of  Tudor  and  Jacobean  effigies,  and  have 
a  taste  for  the  company  of   these  eloquently  silent 
knights  and  ladies  whose  very  clothes  and  weapons  make 
one  think,  Charlecote  Church  is  well  worth  the  trouble 
of  getting  the  key.     There  are  three  successive  Sir 
Thomas's  here  with  their  ladies.     The  first  of  them, 
stretched   on   a   panelled  tomb,  is  the   identical   old 
knight  who  fell  foul  of  Shakespeare.     He  lies  clad  in 
armour,  and  must  have  died  (1600)  after  his  old  and 
once  humble  enemy  had  become  not  merely  famous 
in  England,  but,  by  that  other  and  mundane  standard 
in  which  he  cherished  what  seems  to  us  curious  ambitions 
for  such  a  man,  a  person  of  some  importance  in  the 
neighbourhood.     His    wife   Joyce,   who    predeceased 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  307 

him,  lies  by  his  side  in  the  close-fitting  cap  and  gown  of 
the  period.  Her  virtues  are  set  forth  by  her  husband 
on  a  slab  above.  On  the  panels  of  the  tomb  the 
younger  Thomas  kneels,  already  a  knight,  confronting 
his  sister.  He  only  enjoyed  five  years  of  his  inherit- 
ance when  he  too  was  laid  out  in  efiigy,  his  second  wife, 
who  survived  him  more  than  thirty  years,  kneeling  on 
a  stone  cushion  near  by,  attired  in  a  high  black  gown 
with  a  stomacher  and  ruff.  Their  son,  the  third  Sir 
Thomas,  reclines  under  an  arcaded  canopy  resting  on 
four  columns.  He  is  in  white  marble  and  reclines 
upon  his  left  elbow,  while  his  wife,  in  a  low-bodied 
dress  and  hood,  lies  beside  him.  He  seems  to  have 
been  killed  by  a  fall  from  his  horse  in  the  year  1640. 
If  Sir  Thomas  had  been  a  somewhat  lesser  man,  the 
manner  of  death  would  have  suggested  Stratford 
Market.  The  mortality  among  the  smaller  squires, 
resulting  from  what  was  and  is  still  known  as  "  market- 
peartness,"  was  prodigious.  Three  generations  of 
Welsh  squires  of  a  manor  whose  story  is  well  known 
to  me  were  thus  successively  laid  low. 

Hampton  Lucy,  on  the  farther  side  of  the  park, 
just  across  the  river,  owes  something  to  a  sonorous 
and  suggestive  name,  for  the  church  is  new,  and  the 
bridge  which  spans  the  river  is  of  iron.  The  last 
fact,  however,  in  no  way  detracts  from  the  pleasant 
glimpses  of  the  Avon  both  up  and  down,  which  is 
afforded  from  its  centre,  and  though  the  church  is  not 
a  century  old,  it  is  a  very  fine  specimen  of  the  Decor- 
ated style,  tastefully  embellished  within  and  without. 
Most  of  it  was  built  by  one  of  the  Lucy  family,  who 
was  rector  of  the  parish  for  over  half  a  century.  But 
the  village  is  old  enough,  and  one  of  the  most  alluring 
in  the  neighbourhood.  It  was  given  by  Queen  Mary, 
the   martyr-making   Mary,   to  the   Lucys,   who   then 


308  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

added  their  name  to  it.  It  cost  this  royal  and  un- 
compromising devotee  nothing,  to  be  sure,  for  she 
filched  it  from  the  diocese  of  Worcester,  probably  as  a 
rap  over  the  knuckles  to  some  non-compliant  bishop. 
She  and  her  husband,  Philip  of  Spain,  are  commem- 
orated upon  a  window  in  the  church,  where  may 
be  seen  the  coats  of  arms  of  this  truly  miserable  pair. 
A  little  way  up  the  river  towards  Stratford  on  the 
east  bank  is  Alveston,  where  is  another  large,  modern, 
and  much  less  ornamental  church.  Nearer  the  river, 
however,  are  the  remains  of  its  predecessor,  consisting 
of  a  chancel  and  a  bell-cot  heavily  draped  in  ivy. 
Within  it  is  the  effigy  of  one  of  Shakespeare's  con- 
temporaries, Mr.  Nicholas  Lane,  no  doubt  of  the 
family  who  proved  such  invaluable  friends  to  Charles  II. 
This  gentleman,  who  died  in  1595,  has  been  removed 
from  his  once  recumbent  position  and  propped  up 
against  the  wall.  He  is  bare-headed,  with  curly  locks, 
moustached  and  bearded,  and  elaborately  clad,  after 
the  fashion  of  the  day,  in  ruff,  doublet,  trunk  hose, 
cuffs,  and  girt  with  sword  and  dagger.  On  each  side 
a  son,  both  duplicates  of  their  sire,  kneels  in  filial 
piety. 

The  Warwick  road  from  Charlecote  village  runs 
near  the  river  by  Wasperton  to  Barford,  where  it 
crosses  the  Avon  by  an  eighteenth  century  bridge  to 
join  almost  immediately  the  main  Stratford  and 
Warwick  highway  already  alluded  to  with  some 
feeling.  But  it  is  pleasanter  to  take  a  leafy  byroad 
that  runs  from  Barford  to  Warwick,  skirting  the 
castle  park  for  a  long  distance  and  entering  the  town 
over  its  famous  bridge,  together  with  the  old  Leaming- 
ton road.  This  district  seems  to  have  wiped  out  its 
old  churches  at  more  or  less  the  same  period  with 
quite  startling  unanimity.     Alveston,  Hampton  Lucy, 


STRATFORD  TO  WARWICK  309 

with  Wasperton  and  Barford  immediately  adjoining 
them  are  all  new.  I  know  of  no  such  clean  sweep 
anywhere  in  England.  A  passion  for  building  must 
have  seized  upon  the  district  and  upon  a  generation 
lacking  something  surely  in  a  regard  for  the  past. 
Barford,  however,  retains  its  ancient  tower  upon 
which  are  visible  shot-marks,  said  to  have  been  caused 
by  the  Parliamentary  troops  on  their  way  to  Edgehill, 
because  the  Royal  Standard  flew  from  the  battlements. 
The  village  is  a  large,  substantial,  and  altogether 
pleasing  one,  losing  nothing  in  character  by  its  prox- 
imity to  the  Avon  and  the  fine  brick  bridge  that 
lifts  the  main  road  over  it ;  but  I  do  not  think  there 
is  anything  more  of  special  interest  to  detain  us 
in  it,  and  the  fine  presence  of  Warwick  looms  near. 


CHAPTER    XI 
WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH 

THE   ancient   town   of   Warwick  has  beyond   all 
question  an  air  of  great  distinction.     Its  pose 
is  admirable,  clustering  as  it  does  on  a  ridge  lifted  up 
considerably    above    a    virtually    fiat    country.     The 
other  Avon  towns  have  all  their  special  charms,  but 
Warwick  has  singular  dignity,  as  becomes  the  capital 
of  a  great  and  prominent  county.     No  other  town  in 
the  Midlands — for  Oxford  is  another  affair  altogether — 
approaches  it.     It  is  bright  and  clean  too,  having,  I 
think,  no  besmirching  industries,  just  the  centre  of  a 
farming  and  a  hunting  country.     It  almost  looks  as 
if  it  were  on  show,  but  there  is  always  the  quiet  stir 
of  an  important  country  town  going  forward,  while 
shining  brass  plates  on  the  doors  of  roomy  houses 
bear  the  names  of  firms  that  suggest  substance  and 
time-honoured  connections  with    an  extremely  solid 
county.     There  is  nothing  dead-alive  about  Warwick. 
On  the  other  hand,  its  activity  is  of  a  harmonious 
kind,  and  seems  in  sympathy  with  the  atmosphere  of 
the  green  and  leafy  region  tributary  to  it.     There  is 
another  element,  however,  and  a  very  important  one, 
which  keeps  Warwick  in  decent  animation  throughout 
the  summer,  and  that  is  the  tourist.     An  increasing 
number  of  Americans,  I  am  told,  make  it  their  head- 
quarters, Stratford  having  been  over-confident  in  its 
monopoly  and  too  venturesome  in  its  charges,  an  im- 
providence which,  if  true,  time  will  cure.     Leamington, 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  311 

too,  is  within  a  mile  or  so,  and  the  temptation  of 
the  abounding  Leamingtonians,  with  time  on  their 
hands,  to  walk  into  Warwick  and  come  back  by  tram 
must  be  irresistible.  The  iirst  serious  pedestrian  enter- 
prise I  ever  made  in  my  life  was  from  Leamington 
to  Warwick  at  the  mature  age  of  four.  It  was  along 
the  old  road,  of  course,  and  the  view  of  the  castle  from 
the  bridge  made  such  a  prodigious  impression  on 
my  infant  mind  that  the  picture  remained  with  me 
for  life ;  and  when  I  saw  it  again  the  other  day  for  the 
first  time,  after  half  a  century,  it  seemed  perfectly 
familiar.  This  banal  bit  of  personal  biography  is 
only  justifiable  by  way  of  an  incidental  attestation 
to  the  uncommon  grandeur  of  the  prospect  on  entering 
Warwick  from  the  east.  And  even  from  the  west,  by 
the  Stratford  road,  the  actual  entrance  to  the  town  is 
very  notable,  climbing  up  as  it  does  to  the  prominent 
towers  and  gables  of  the  Leicester  hospital,  which  have 
all  the  air  of  a  gate-house. 

But  the  view  of  the  castle,  with  its  noble  array  of 
grey  towers  and  walls  springing  high  above  the  rich 
luxuriance  of  grove  and  lawn  and  stream,  cannot  be 
suggested  by  description.  Fortunately  it  need  not  be, 
as  our  artist  steps  in  to  better  purpose.  Once  again 
the  little  Avon,  cunningly  magnified  to  much  more 
than  its  natural  dimensions  by  the  milldam  just  below, 
lends  itself  to  furthering  the  adornment  of  a  town,  and 
that  the  greatest  of  the  half-dozen  that  lie  on  its  banks. 
Boats  flit  upon  its  surface,  often  bright  patches  of 
moving  colour  from  the  gay  apparel  of  some  fair 
freight,  between  the  tall  mantling  foliage  and  the  hoary 
castle  walls  so  imposingly  upreared.  To  the  average 
traveller,  British  or  otherwise,  who  has  in  no  way 
soaked  himself  in  mediaeval  or  Tudor  England,  and 
perhaps  only  knows  the  country  in  bits  here  and 
there,  one  castle  conveys  much  the  same  impression  as 


312  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

another — that  of  battle,  murder,  and  sudden  death, 
being  probably  the  leading  note  it  strikes.  The  bigger 
and  more  imposing  the  fortress  the  more  awesome  and 
sanguinary  is  this  suggestion. 

But  as  a  matter  of  fact,  to  any  one  equipped  with  a 
reasonable  grasp  of  the  times,  these  magnificent  speci- 
mens of  baronial  pomp  and  pride,  set  in  the  heart  of 
England,  do  not  speak  very  loudly  of  storm  and  siege. 
To  me  at  least  they  suggest  rather  the  "  celebrity  at 
home  ",  the  social  and  family  records  of  great  or  royal 
houses,  the  gorgeous  festivals,  the  wassail  and  the 
revelry  of  the  highly  placed,  in  the  varying  fashion  of 
succeeding  epochs.  In  spite  of  the  invulnerable  and 
bellicose  appearance  of  its  exterior,  Warwick  Castle 
seems  a  Windsor  rather  than  a  Ludlow  or  an  Alnwick. 
Of  course  it  took  and  gave  a  few  blows  far  back  in  the 
Barons'  Wars.  But  its  undoubted  historic  interest 
gathers  little  from  the  stirring  scenes  that  cast  a  glamour 
over  the  great  castles  of  the  north  and  west  where  the 
warder  neither  slumbered  nor  slept.  The  watchman 
on  Warwick  battlements  might  have  done  both  with 
impunity  but  on  very  rare  occasions.  Fancy  might 
not  inappropriately  think  of  it  as  a  beautiful  suit  of 
tilting  armour  compared  to  a  coat  of  mail  used  in  the 
field.  Great  men  came  hereto  rest  from  their  sanguinary 
labours,  laden  betimes  with  the  spoils  of  far  provinces 
and  other  countries,  to  build  towers  and  strengthen 
bastions  against  possible  faction,  or  out  of  mere 
pride  in  building,  but  in  this  snug  heart  of  England 
against  no  definite  foe.  For  this  very  reason,  too, 
it  was  a  good  spot  in  which  to  immure  cap- 
tives of  distinction  in  deep  and  noisome  dungeons, 
while  the  wine  flowed  and  the  wassail  proceeded 
merrily  in  a  gay  and  quite  heartless  world  above 
their  heads. 

Ethelfleda,  that  daughter  of  Alfred  the  Great  who 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  313 

must  have  been  a  lady  of  energy  for  the  number  of 
occasions  on  which  she  appears  in  the  chronicles, 
raised  a  fortification  here  called  the  "  Dungeon  "  on  an 
artificial  mound  within  the  area  of  the  present  castle. 
Various  earls  of  Warwick  did  a  good  deal  more  in  the 
building  way  after  the  Conquest ;  but  whatever  this 
may  have  amounted  to  seems  to  have  been  wiped 
out,  for  the  curtain  walls  and  some  of  the  towers  were 
raised  in  the  time  of  the  second  and  third  Edwards. 
Piers  Gaveston,  the  reckless  favourite  of  a  fatuous 
king,  was  immured  here,  and  doubtless  in  the  deepest 
dungeon,  if  the  measure  of  hatred  felt  for  him  by  the 
English  nobility  counted  for  anything.  Edward  the 
Second's  later  favourite,  Hugh  Despenser,  became  in 
due  course  custodian  of  the  castle,  and  entertained 
within  it  the  royal  author  of  his  temporary  good 
fortune.  Thomas  de  Beauchamp  in  the  next  reign 
wrought  the  extensive  building  already  alluded  to,  while 
his  son  of  the  same  name  added  Guy's  Tower.  Henry 
the  Fifth  was  entertained  here  by  Richard  de  Beau- 
champ,  after  which  a  Beauchamp  heiress  carried  the 
earldom  to  the  famous  Richard  Neville,  the  King- 
maker. Edward  IV  was  brought  to  Warwick  as 
prisoner  by  this  man  of  might,  on  whose  death  the 
castle  passed  to  his  son-in-law,  George,  Duke  of  Clar- 
ence. Richard  III  was  here  twice,  and  in  Edward  the 
Sixth's  reign  the  property  was  given  to  the  Dudleys. 
Ambrose  Dudley  entertained  Elizabeth  on  two  occa- 
sions in  the  castle,  but  after  his  death  it  reverted  to 
the  Crown.  In  1605,  and  in  a  ruinous  condition,  it  was 
granted  to  Sir  Fulke  Greville,  a  descendant  of  the 
Beauchamps,  who  expended  a  very  large  sum  in  repairs 
and  additions,  and  James  I  paid  him  no  less  than 
four  visits.  This  family  have  held  the  estates  ever 
since,  but  the  Earldom  of  Warwick  had  become  alienated 
to  that  of  Richard,  and  on  the  latter  dying  out  in  1759 


314  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

it  was  conferred  on  the  Grevilles  in  the  person  of  Lord 
Brooke,  a  title  now  borne  by  the  eldest  son  of  the 
house.  The  Lord  Brooke  of  the  time  of  the  Civil  War 
was  a  Parliamentarian,  and  the  county  of  Warwick 
being  a  stronghold  of  that  party,  the  castle  was  only 
submitted  to  one  brief  and  irresolute  siege.  The  Earl 
of  Lindsay,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  carried  here 
from  the  field  of  Edgehill  to  die.  Of  royal  and  noble 
persons  Warwick  in  truth  has  had  its  fill,  and  it  is 
as  a  residence  rather  than  a  fortress  that  it  makes  its 
historic  appeal. 

Warwick  Castle  is  as  accessible  as  a  cathedral.  It 
costs  a  little  more,  namely,  2s.  a  head  and  a  gratuity 
to  the  gorgeous  wight  who  plants  himself  so  skilfully 
on  a  strategic  point  of  exit  for  its  acceptance,  when  all 
is  over,  that  it  would  be  a  bold  man  who  would  pass 
him  by,  and  for  aught  I  know  an  unjust  one.  A 
substantial  following  go  round  at  his  heels  many  times 
a  day,  and  his  perorations  in  each  chamber  are  audible 
and  efficacious.  I  speak  impersonally,  for  there  are 
no  doubt  two  or  three  custodians  on  show  duty.  One 
man  could  not  stand  it.  I  do  not  know  what  the  King- 
maker would  say  to  it,  though  some  of  his  sources  of 
revenue  were  perhaps  nothing  like  so  honest,  and  for  any- 
thing I  know  to  the  contrary  this  one  goes  to  a  hospital. 

I  admit  to  some  disappointment  in  my  progress 
through  the  rooms  of  Warwick  Castle,  not  because  the 
proportions  or  decorations  of  these  stately  chambers 
lacked  aught,  nor  because  there  was  a  something  in 
the  spirit  of  them  not  quite  in  harmony  with  the 
atmosphere  one  would  have  fain  breathed.  That,  to 
be  sure,  is  almost  inevitable  in  an  occupied  residence, 
above  all,  the  residence  of  persons  who  live  in  the 
foremost  stream  of  social  life.  But  a  house  that  is  a 
museum  of  works  of  art  and  pictures  yields  but  poor 
satisfaction  to  a  hurried  scramble  round.     As  a  matter 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  315 

of  fact,  save  for  a  picture  here  and  there,  or  some 
suggestive  relic  of  the  family,  the  rest  of  the  business 
in  all  such  places,  however  interesting,  with  opportunity 
and  leisure  as  an  abstract  entertainment,  is  out  of 
touch   with    the    mood    in    which    one    explores   the 
exterior  of  an  ancient  and  famous  haunt.     But  there 
is  no  question  of  exploration  in  Warwick  Castle,  nor 
opportunity  for  dreaming  dreams,   nor  for  thinking 
over   canvases  or    objects  here  and  there  conducive 
to  meditation.     And  it  would  be  quite  foolish  to  expect 
anything  of  the  kind.     Upon  the  whole,  the  public, 
particularly   the   hustling   portion   of   it,    should    be 
thankful  to  spend  half  an  hour  within  these  historic 
walls  with  the  comfortable  sensation  of  having  paid 
for  it.     The  awful  part  of  these  processions  is  when 
the  showman — not  being  of  the  sensitive  nature  and 
breeding  of  Mr.  Henry  James,  enthusiast,  alluded  to 
in  an  earlier  chapter — drops  into  the  bathos  natural  to 
his  clay,  and  informs  his  audience  that  the  escritoire 
before  them  is  the  one  on  which  my  lady  writes  her 
notes  after  breakfast,  or  that  the  small  drawing-room 
beyond  is  a  place  of  withdrawal  for  the  family  after 
dinner  when  there  is  no  company.     This  is  too  awful, 
and  indeed  I  would  not  swear  that  any  of  these  appalling 
lapses  occur  at  all  at  Warwick  Castle.     But  speaking 
generally  from  a  pretty  wide  experience,  they  are  too 
often  part  of  the  cicerone's  stock  in  trade.     After  all, 
if  a  shiver  runs  down  the  back  of  some  of  us  there  are 
many  backs  in  the  crowd  that  experience  nothing  of 
the  kind.     Many  people  from  other  countries  no  doubt 
get  their  only  glimpse  on  these  occasions  of  English 
domestic  life,  and  that  too  on  the  highest  and  most 
luxurious  plane,  and  many  honest  English  folk  un- 
doubtedly regard  this  as  the  main  part  of  the  show 
and  well  worth  half  a  crown,  and  very  naturally. 
In  rather  amusing  evidence  of  the  trustworthiness 


3i6  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

of  tradition,  the  armour  of  the  redoubtable  but  rather 
mythical  Guy  of  Warwick  is  among  the  relics  at  the 
castle.  The  industrious  and  destructive  antiquary, 
however,  has  pronounced  that  each  piece  belongs  to 
a  different  period,  extending  from  the  time  of  Edward 
III  to  that  of  the  Stuarts.  The  great  hall,  over 
60  feet  long,  is  imposingly  equipped  with  suits  and 
pieces  of  armour,  some  of  them  actually  worn  by 
famous  persons  such  as  Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of 
Leicester,  Graham,  Marquis  of  Montrose,  and  so 
forth.  There  are  a  goodly  number  of  old  masters 
hanging  on  the  walls  of  the  chambers  through  which 
the  public  are  shown,  a  catalogue  of  which  would  not, 
I  think,  divert  the  reader.  The  hall,  however,  has 
a  special  interest  as  being  the  traditional  scene  of 
Piers  Gaveston's  torchlight  trial  when  Guy  Beau- 
champ  and  his  brother  earls,  raging  with  the  insults 
he  had  heaped  upon  them  and  the  nicknames  he 
had  called  them,  spurned  his  petitions  for  mercy  and 
handed  him  over  to  the  executioner.  An  utterly 
illegal  business, it  maybe  remembered, as  the  wretched 
man  was  on  his  way  to  a  formal  trial  by  Parliament 
when  the  Earl  of  Warwick  caught  him  on  the  road. 

The  outer  gate  of  the  castle  is  modern,  but  the  way 
leading  thence  through  the  outer  court  is  singularly 
picturesque,  winding  through  a  cutting  of  solid  rock 
overhung  with  verdure,  and  disclosing  at  its  ex- 
tremity the  noble  fourteenth  century  gateway  with 
Guy's  and  Csesar's  Towers  on  the  right  and  left 
respectively.  The  former,  raised  at  the  end  of  the 
fourteenth  century,  is  twelve-sided  and  128  feet 
high.  Caesar's  Tower  is  a  little  earlier  and 
consists  of  four  stories,  each  with  a  vaulted 
roof,  and  is  20  feet  higher  than  the  other.  This 
tower,  resting  on  a  rock  foundation,  is  considered  a 
masterpiece   of    military   engineering   as   regards   its 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  317 

outer  face,  and  the  construction  and  arrangement  of  the 
loopholes   for   archery.     It  has  also  a   sloping  base, 
from    which    heavy    projectiles,    dropped    from    the 
machicolated  battlements,  would  rebound  with  great 
force  into  the  faces  of  an  enemy.     Outside  the  gate- 
way, on  the  verge  of  the  drawbridge  which  once  crossed 
the  moat,  is  a  barbican  two  stories  high,  with  two 
octagonal  turrets  loopholed  for  archers.     There  is  a 
portcullis  to  the  barbican  and  also  to  the  gateway, 
nearly  twenty  yards  in  the  rear,  with  every  facility  for 
precipitating  missiles  on  the  head  of  a  foe  who  should 
penetrate  the  first  and  attack  the  second.     Within  the 
inner  court  is  a  fine  grass  plot  nearly  two  acres  in 
extent,  to  which  the  later  and  residential  part  of  the 
castle  presents  its  ivied  front  and  mullioned  windows. 
The  dungeon  of  a  castle — when  a  firmly  established 
authentic    dungeon  like    that    at    Warwick    beneath 
Caesar's  Tower — is  more  effective  in  its  appeal  to  the 
emotions  than  a  state  drawing-room,  or  should  be,  for 
in  descending  into  such  dismal  shades  one  is  dropped 
indeed   into  the   Middle   Ages.     No   change   is   here, 
and  one  breathes  the  dank  smell  of  a  chamber  where 
time  has   stood   absolutely   still,   and   whose  pitiless 
walls  and  gloomy  vaulted  roof  look   so  contemptu- 
ously indifferent  to  the  flight  of  years.     One  thinks 
of    Gaveston   again,    for    there   is    always  something 
fascinating  about  that  accomplished  man  who  could 
so  outwit  in  talk  the  ponderous,  slow-thinking,  egre- 
giously  self-satisfied  Anglo-Norman  barons,  and  then 
proceed  to  unhorse  them  in  the  tilting-ring  and  beat 
them  at  their  own  game.     But  Gaveston's  brief  incon- 
veniences here   must   have  been  trifling  to  the  long 
roll  of  forgotten  sufferers.     What  wonder  when  their 
turn  came  that  revenge  must  have  been  the  sweetest 
of  the  senses  and  an  exhilarating  and  prolonged  joy. 
There  are  a  great  many  illegible  mementoes  of  these 


31 8  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

unfortunates  upon  the  walls,  but  the  only  decipherable 
names  are  those  of  humble  persons  of  later  date  who 
had  no  chance  of  revenge.  One  of  them  is  John 
Smith,  gunner  to  His  Majesty,  who  from  his  dates 
spent  the  whole  period  of  the  Civil  War  here,  and 
never  had  a  chance  even  to  train  a  gun  upon  a  Round- 
head. For  the  dungeon,  however,  a  special  permit 
is,  or  was,  essential.  The  Earl  of  Lindsay,  the  royal 
commander  at  Edgehill,  died  in  Guy's  Tower.  The 
view  from  the  spacious  gardens  of  the  castle  over  the 
finely  timbered  park,  through  which  the  Avon  flows,  is 
very  charming,  while  there  are  of  course  innumerable 
things  both  inside  and  out  to  be  seen  that  will  be  found 
catalogued  in  every  local  handbook. 

As  I  have  before  remarked,  the  town  of  Warwick 
is  a  little  flattered  by  its  commanding  site.  As  you 
look  westward,  in  the  direction  of  Stratford,  from 
that  end  of  the  High  Street  where  the  beautiful  old 
Leicester  hospital  forms,  as  it  were,  one  side  of  the 
frame  to  the  picture,  the  green  landscape  seems  to 
lie  far  beneath  and  conveys  the  effect  of  standing  in 
more  of  a  hill  town  than  Warwick  actually  is.  This 
same  hospital  is,  of  course,  one  of  the  sights  of  the 
town  and  deserves  to  be.  It  was  mainly  built  in 
the  reign  of  Henry  VI  as  a  hall  for  the  guilds  of  St. 
George  and  Holy  Trinity,  and  at  the  Dissolution  be- 
came the  property  of  the  town  and  was  used  as  a  burgess 
hall.  Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of  Leicester,  being  seized 
about  the  year  1570  with  charitable  intentions  to- 
wards old  or  maimed  soldiers  of  the  neighbourhood, 
persuaded  the  burgesses  to  give  the  hall,  while  he 
supplied  the  funds  from  parcels  of  land  for  the  neces- 
sary endowment  of  a  master  and  twelve  inmates. 
Nothing,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  has  broken  the 
peaceful  possession  of  successive  inmates  from  that 
day  to  this.     Some  slight  deviation  from  the  original 


'^i. 


x^:' 


vftiT~T"'  i:h7' 


.'  -     M 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  319 

qualifications  has  taken  place,  so  I  gathered  from 
the  chatty  and  amiable  veteran  of  their  number 
who  did  the  honours  for  my  benefit ;  but  this  matters 
nothing  here. 

Externally  the  old  hospital,  together  with  one  or 
two  adjoining  houses  of  the  same  date,  makes  a  noble 
group  of  clustering  gables  and  chimneys,  while  the 
fourteenth  century  chapel  of  the  old  guild,  with  its 
battlemented  tower  and  arched  roadway  beneath  it, 
completes  a  corner  which,  together  with  its  command- 
ing situation,  is  probably  not  surpassed  in  any  English 
country  town.   The  hospital  forms  a  quadrangle  entered 
by  an  arched  gateway  surmounted  with  the  famous  bear 
and  ragged  staff.     The  master's  lodge  fills  one  side,  also 
decorated  in  colour  with  the  same  significant  badge  as 
well  as  the  porcupine  of  the  Sidneys,  to  whom  the 
Dudley  property,   including    the    patronship   of    this 
hospital,  came.    The  carved  barge  boards  of  the  gables, 
too,  terminate   in    white    bears    hugging    poles.     On 
another  side  are  two  cloister  corridors,  one  above  the 
other.     Each  inmate  has  a  bedroom  and  sitting-room 
and  generous  allowance,  and  these  quarters  of  course 
occupy  a  good  part  of  the  building.     But  the  old 
banqueting  hall  remains,  though  for  less  worthy  uses, 
and  an  inscription  proclaims  the  fact  that  James  I  was 
entertained  here  in  1617  by  Sir  Fulke  Greville,  Chan- 
cellor of  the  Exchequer.    One  is  shown,  too,  a  few  relics, 
interesting  and  otherwise,  and  some  rude  bits  of  old 
furniture.     The   chapel    is    more    noteworthy    for    its 
exterior  and  its  fine  pose,  with  the  old  town  gateway 
running  underneath  it.     The  interior  is  quite  plain 
and  has  been  restored,  though  an  old  oak  screen  and 
a  few  other  articles  of  the  original  furniture  remain 
in  it.     The  gateway  beneath  the  chapel  has  a  vaulted 
roof  and  is  part  of  the  old  fortification  of  the  twelfth 
century,  the  iron  stanchion  of  the  gate  being  still  in  situ. 


m 


320  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

On  the  northern  fringe  of  the  town  is  a  picturesque 
old  house  known  as  the  Priory,  all  that  remains  of  a 
monastery  founded  by  the  first  Earl  of  Warwick  and 
granted  at  the  Dissolution  to  a  retainer  of  the  Dudleys, 
one  Hawkins,  who  immediately  pulled  down  the 
monastic  buildings  and  built  the  present  house,  which 
has  had  many  curious  vicissitudes  of  ownership  and 
sheltered  many  personages  of  renown.  Queen  Elizabeth 
on  one  occasion  paid  a  surprise  visit  to  the  Earl  and 
Countess  of  Warwick  and  found  them  supping  here, 
though  their  host  was  confined  to  his  room  with  the 
gout,  which  did  not  prevent  the  lively  queen  from 
looking  him  up  and  no  doubt  recommending  him  a 
prescription.  The  house,  a  private  residence,  was 
partly  rebuilt  in  the  eighteenth  century,  but  still 
contains  some  of  the  old  windows,  panelled  rooms, 
and  the  original  oak  staircase. 

But  the  most  distinguished  piece  of  ancient  archi- 
tecture in  Warwick,  next  to  the  castle,  is  that  of  the 
church  of  St.  Mary,  occupying  a  most  conspicuous 
position  and  lifting  heavenwards  a  tower  that 
measures  to  the  top  of  the  pinnacles  over  170 
feet.  The  word  ancient  requires  some  qualification, 
for  in  a  great  fire,  which  wrought  destruction  to  the 
town  in  1694,  the  church  was  ignited  and  a  considerable 
portion  of  it  so  gutted  that  it  had  to  be  rebuilt,  the  east 
end  and  the  beautiful  building  known  as  the  Beauchamp 
Chapel  being  almost  all  of  it  remaining  intact.  The 
tower  and  nave  were  rebuilt  by  a  local  builder,  with 
a  result  that  causes  a  stranger  encountering  so  vast 
and  important  a  building  for  the  first  time  no  little 
bewilderment.  All  kinds  of  curious  devices  in  the  shape 
of  window  tracery  and  uncanny  ornaments  confront 
him.  A  little  way  off  the  stately  proportions  of  tower 
and  nave  are  unquestionably  imposing,  and  the  more 
so  from  their  admirable  site  ;  but  at  close  quarters  the 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  321 

topical  disease  of  the  period  breaks  out  everywhere  in 
the  pseudo-classic  detail,  of  which  the  Williamite  and 
Georgian  were  obsessed,  mingled  with  the  Gothic  in 
grotesque  alliance. 

One  is  accustomed  to  a  frank  and  complete  pagan 
temple  like  that  of  St.  Chad's  at  Shrewsbury,  which 
the  extraordinary  and  preposterous  taste  of  the  time 
seemed  quite  proud  to  gather  in  as  a  place  of  Christian 
worship  without  a  thought  as  to  the  humours  of  the 
situation.  But  Warwick  is  a  curious  blend  that  is 
almost  more  startling.  However,  this  is  of  no  imme- 
diate interest.  The  eastern  portion  of  the  church, 
that  happily  no  local  re-builder  was  needed  for,  is  to  the 
point  here.  The  choir  escaped  the  conflagration  and 
consequently  the  local  artificer,  and  is  probably  of  the 
same  date  as  the  Beauchamp  Chapel  opening  out  of  it, 
the  middle,  that  is,  of  the  fifteenth  century.  It  is  lighted 
by  four  four-light  windows  on  each  side,  with  panel 
work  below  and  an  east  window  of  similar  fashion 
but  of  six  lights,  divided  by  a  transom.  The  roof  of  the 
choir  is  groined  and  has  four  bays,  and  an  angel  bearing 
the  shield  of  the  Beauchamps  is  displayed  on  each. 
This  handsome  roof  is  further  supported  by  flying 
ribs,  and  is  altogether  a  singularly  graceful  piece  of 
fifteenth  century  workmanship.  In  the  middle  of 
the  choir  is  a  lofty  tomb  upon  which  lie  in  effigy  Thomas 
Beauchamp,  Earl  of  Warwick,  the  founder,  and  his  wife 
the  daughter  of  Roger  Mortimer,  Earl  of  March,  both  of 
whom  died  in  1369.  Around  the  tomb  are  thirty  or 
forty  figures  that  are  supposed  to  represent  connections 
of  this  potent  house.  The  feet  of  the  earl,  who  is  in 
armour,  rest  upon  a  bear,  and  his  hand  holds  that  of  his 
wife,  whose  feet  are  on  a  lamb. 

There  are  some  curious  mortuary  plates  in  front  of 
the  altar,  while  unmarked  near  the  vestry  door  lie 
the  remains  of  William  Parr,  Marquis  of  Northampton, 

21 


322  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

brother  to  Queen  Catherine  of  that  name,  who  is  said 
in  the  "  Black  Book  of  Warwick  "  to  have  died  so  poor 
that  there  was  not  sufficient  wherewith  to  bury  him 
in  accordance  with  his  rank.  So  he  was  put  in  pickle 
till  something  could  be  done.  Queen  Elizabeth  came 
to  the  rescue  so  far  as  the  essentials  were  concerned, 
but  no  one  apparently  came  forward  to  mark  his 
resting-place  with  any  inscription  or  memorial.  Surely 
the  Parrs  were  a  family  of  singular  ill-luck  in  this 
particular,  for  the  like  adventures  of  his  sister.  Queen 
Catherine's  corpse,  at  Sudely  will  be  remembered.  In 
an  octagonal  room  near  the  vestry,  supposed  to  have 
been  the  chapter  -  house,  stands  a  great  monument 
to  Fulke,  Lord  Brooke,  which  tells  us  that  he  was 
servant  to  Queen  Elizabeth,  councillor  to  King  James, 
and  friend  to  Sir  Philip  Sidney.  He  was  stabbed  by  a 
discontented  servant,  who  then  killed  himself.  A  very 
different  individual,  and  of  a  very  different  age,  is  com- 
memorated by  a  bust  in  a  niche  on  the  wall  of  the  ex- 
ceedingly plain  nave.  This  is  Walter  Savage  Landor,  the 
eccentric  scholar  and  poet  who  was  born  at  Warwick, 
though  a  Yorkshireman  by  possessions,  and  educated 
at  Rugby.  Beneath  the  choir  is  a  crypt,  some  of  the 
pillars  of  which  are  Norman  and  date  from  the  original 
twelfth  century  church.  Opening  out  of  the  choir  is 
the  beautiful  Beauchamp  Chapel,  which  would  redeem 
the  church  from  obscurity  if  the  rest  of  it  were  cast  on 
the  lines  of  a  cotton  factory,  which  is  far  indeed  from 
being  the  case. 

This  building,  to  which  one  descends  by  a  flight  of 
steps,  was  founded  upon  money  left  for  the  purpose 
by  Richard  Beauchamp,  Earl  of  Warwick,  and  occupied 
the  twenty  years  between  1443  and  1464  in  the  con- 
struction, costing  a  prodigious  sum.  It  was  intended 
as  a  mortuary  chapel  for  the  testator,  and  has  scarcely 
a  superior  in  England  of  its  kind.     As  one  descends 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  323 

into  the  chapel,  which  is  lower  than  the  church,  by  a 
flight  of  steps,  its  beautiful  proportions  and  superb 
decorations  display  themselves  to  extraordinary  ad- 
vantage. The  east  window  occupies  the  whole  space 
of  the  wall,  and  filled  with  the  much  mutilated  and 
disconnected  fragments  of  the  original  painted  glass 
is  very  fine.  The  two  principal  mullions  as  well  as  the 
architrave  are  filled  with  canopied  niches,  many  of 
them  containing  gilt  and  painted  images.  The  painted 
glass  originally  represented  the  figure  of  Richard 
Beauchamp,  with  those  of  his  wife  and  children  and 
some  famous  characters  in  sacred  history.  The 
iconoclasts,  whether  those  of  the  sixteenth  or  seven- 
teenth centuries,  have  not  left  very  much  that  is 
intelligible,  but  the  general  effect  of  the  window,  with 
its  rich  ornamentation  and  tracery,  is  very  striking. 
Here  as  everywhere  the  bear  and  ragged  staff,  suggestive 
of  nothing  if  not  the  characteristic  pride  and  merciless 
arrogant  egotism  of  a  great  mediaeval  baron,  alternates 
with  the  meek  heads  of  saints  and  emblems  of  Christian 
virtue  and  humility,  as  if  the  commemorated  grantee 
had  spent  his  life  in  washing  poor  men's  feet  and  offer- 
ing a  second  cheek  to  the  smiter.  The  whole  interior 
of  the  building,  which  is  about  60  feet  long,  where 
not  occupied  by  tombs  and  windows,  is  richly  panelled 
and  arcaded.  The  floor  is  of  black  and  white  marble 
in  diamond  pattern,  the  roof  groined  and  of  three 
bays,  the  work  being  of  a  marvellously  intricate  and 
ornate  character.  The  side  windows  are  of  plain 
glass,  but  their  tracery  in  style  and  decoration  is  in 
full  harmony  with  the  rest  of  the  building. 

With  all  its  grace  and  beauty  this  last  is  not  less 
distinguished  for  the  tombs  contained  within  it. 
Almost  in  the  centre  is  the  altar  tomb  of  the  founder, 
fashioned  of  Purbeck  marble  and  surmounted  by  a 
curious,  open,  hooped  frame  intended  to  support  the 


324  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE  S  COUNTRY 

pall,  which  was  of  crimson  velvet  and  remained  here 
till  a  century  ago.  Beneath  this,  resplendent  in  gilt 
and  brass,  with  bared  head  resting  on  a  helmet,  but 
otherwise  in  full  armour  and  his  feet  upon  a  muzzled 
bear  and  griffin,  lies  the  great  man,  Richard  Beauchamp, 
Earl  of  Warwick.  The  inscription,  freely  intermingled 
with  bears  and  staves,  tells  us  among  other  things  that 
the  hero  died  in  1439  at  Rouen,  and  furthermore, 
what  really  does  make  one  think  when  set  forth  in 
matter  of  fact  fashion  in  cold  stone,  was  "  Lieutenant- 
General  and  Governor  of  the  Realm  of  France  and 
Duchy  of  Normandy  ".  Around  the  tomb,  standing 
in  fourteen  canopied  niches,  are  as  many  of  the  living 
relatives  of  the  deceased  fashioned  in  gilt,  among  whom, 
as  may  be  imagined,  are  the  greatest  personages  of 
their  day.  Talbot,  Earl  of  Shrewsbury,  is  here,  and 
so  is  Richard  Neville,  the  king-maker,  who  was  to  step 
into  the  founder's  title  and  possessions  through  marriage 
with  his  heiress. 

Near  this  is  another  altar  tomb  on  which  reposes 
the  effigy  of  Ambrose  Dudley,  known  as  the  "  Good  " 
Earl  of  Warwick.  The  virtue  no  doubt  was  his  own, 
the  earldom  was  conferred  on  him  by  Queen  Elizabeth, 
being  also  son  and  heir  to  the  Duke  of  Northumber- 
land. He  was  a  brother  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Leicester, 
and  must,  if  he  deserved  his  reputation,  have  been  an 
altogether  different  kind  of  person  from  that  shallow 
egotist.  He  died  childless  in  1589,  and  he  too  was 
lieutenant-general,  but  not  governor,  for  times  had 
sadly  altered  in  the  relations  of  England  to  the  Duchy 
of  Normandy.  Against  the  north  wall,  in  somewhat 
painful  contrast  to  the  quiet  and  chaste  altar  tombs 
of  these  great  men,  is  the  gorgeous  erection  reared  by 
a  decadent  taste  to  a  person  for  whom  such  a  florid 
departure  was  not  wholly  inappropriate,  no  less  a  one 
than  Robert,  Earl  of  Leicester,  himself.     Some  one 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  325 

has  called  it  a  "  mountain  of  confectionery  ",  but  there 
is  the  structure  and  the  flanking  Corinthian  columns 
supporting  the  massive  superstructure.  The  effigy, 
like  that  of  the  countess  by  his  side,  who  erected  the 
tomb,  is  painted  to  resemble  life.  The  earl  is  bare- 
headed, with  moustaches  and  a  spade  beard.  He  is  in 
rich  armour,  over  which  is  thrown  the  mantle  of  the 
Order  of  the  Garter  and  a  fur  tippet.  Around  his 
neck  is  a  collar  of  scallop  shells  and  the  jewel  of  the 
Order  of  St.  Michael  of  France.  Below  the  knee,  as  is 
also  the  case  with  the  other  effigies,  is  the  Order  of  the 
Garter.  The  lady  is  attired  in  a  ruff  and  a  high  gown 
and  a  mantle  of  scarlet  and  ermine. 

Against  the  south  wall  of  the  chapel  is  a  monument 
to  the  infant  son  of  the  above  distinguished  couple. 
Baron  Denbigh;  and  nowhere  was  Leicester  more  justly 
hated  than  upon  those  Welsh  estates  whence  he  drew 
his  second  title.  This  child  was  three  years  of  age, 
and  is  said  to  have  been  deformed.  The  small  effigy, 
3  feet  6  inches  in  length,  is  richly  draped,  and  the 
long  inscription  relating  to  the  brief  sojourn  of  the 
original  thus  quaintly  opens  :  "  Heere  resteth  the  body 
of  the  noble  impe  Robert  of  Dudley." 

It  is  not  often  a  building  of  this  size  is  at  once  so 
beautiful  and  of  such  distinguished  associations  with 
the  mighty  and  powerful,  if  not  always  the  great, 
departed.  There  was  no  hurry  here  at  least,  and  I  was 
not  only  happy  in  finding  the  custodian  disengaged,  but 
himself  one  of  those  occasional  officials  who  possess 
an  enthusiasm  for  their  trust  and  are  equipped  with  a 
knowledge  of  history  not  limited  to  their  immediate 
and  silent  wards  and  their  relatives. 

As  one  passes  out  of  Warwick  in  the  direction  of 
Leamington,  it  is  to  descend  the  slope  of  the  ridge  on 
which  the  town  is  set,  and  to  pass  under  the  east  gate, 
upon  which  is  the  chapel  of  St.  Peter,  originally  built 


326  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

in  the  time  of  Henry  VI,  but  badly  restored  in  the 
eighteenth  century.  Leamington  to-day  stretches  out 
its  tentacles  so  far  that  it  is  practically  united  to 
Warwick,  The  old  road  across  the  river  is  still  fairly 
rural,  but  the  route  of  the  tram-cars  upon  the  nearer 
side,  which  hurtle  back  and  forth  between  the  two 
towns,  may  make  eminently  for  convenience  but  not 
for  the  picturesque.  Leamington  abounds,  I  believe, 
in  residential  advantages,  tree-bordered  streets,  bands, 
concerts,  tennis  -  clubs,  healing  waters,  educational 
facilities,  and  is  handy  to  several  packs  of  hounds.  It 
has  its  own  river  too,  the  Leam,  of  small  volume,  to 
be  sure,  but  sufficient  to  sensibly  reduce  that  of  the 
Avon  above  their  confluence. 

The  rise,  however,  of  the  place  is  quite  remarkable. 
In  1800  we  are  told  it  had  thirty  houses.  It  is  now  a 
large  residential  town  akin  to  Cheltenham  and  Harro- 
gate. A  spring  was  known  of  here  in  Camden's  time, 
but  it  was  not  till  near  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  when  several  more  at  various  times  were 
discovered,  that  it  began  to  gather  fame  and  popula- 
tion. Its  cup  of  joy  was  full  when,  after  a  visit  from 
her  late  Majesty  in  1838,  a  petition  to  prefix  the  word 
Royal  to  the  Leamington  Spa  was  graciously  acceded 
to.  I  fancy  the  springs  themselves  nowadays  form 
merely  one  of  the  many  attractions  of  the  place. 

Our  American  friends  are  accustomed  to  express 
surprise  at  the  immense  number  of  people  in  this 
country  who  live  what  may  be  called  detached 
lives  on  their  means,  without  occupation  or  responsi- 
bilities, and  devote  themselves  mainly  to  amuse- 
ment. And  Leamington  is,  I  take  it,  a  community 
where  these  care-free  souls  abound.  Knowing,  I  may 
say,  both  countries,  the  diverse  points  of  view  on  this 
subject  have  always  interested  me  not  a  little,  as  they 
are  so  wide  apart ;  and  I  have  discussed  it  in  the  course 


-I 

o 
< 

a 

X 

H 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  327 

of  my  life  with  scores  of  Americans.  An  English- 
man who  hunted  four  days  a  week  and  shot  the  other 
two  in  due  season,  would  resent  very  much  being  called 
an  idle  man,  and  his  pursuits  being  stigmatized  as 
trifling.  On  the  contrary,  he  would  most  likely  con- 
sider himself  an  extremely  hard-working  person, 
and  his  labours  of  such  kind  as  confer  a  certain 
lustre  and  prestige  that  does  not  belong  to  ordinary 
plodding  success  in  a  profession.  I  have  seldom 
been  able  to  make  my  American  friends  understand 
this,  perhaps  from  lack  of  eloquence,  or  to  convince 
them  that  to  call  an  existence  thus  spent,  or  spent 
in  some  similar  manner,  trifling  or  a  waste  of  life, 
would  simply  be  unintelligible  to  those  thus  occupied. 
In  America  its  old  tradition  still,  I  think,  survives, 
and  a  man,  however  wealthy,  without  an  occupa- 
tion is  contemned,  so  much  so  that  the  wealthy  son 
of  fortune  takes  an  office  and  affects  to  frequent  it. 
This  arises  no  doubt  from  the  tradition  of  a  small 
population  with  a  continent  to  conquer,  further 
stimulated  by  the  old  Puritan  dislike  of  amusement. 
In  its  more  modern  and  developed  phase  it  runs 
perilously  near  the  barbarous  and  uncivilized  notion 
that  money-making  is  the  end  and  aim  of  life.  But 
that  is  evaded  in  the  method  of  argument,  though 
not  perhaps  very  convincingly.  I  can  support  it  myself 
as  well  as  any  American, but  not  to  my  own  satisfaction. 
An  incomplete  new  country,  which  has  demanded 
the  efforts  and  called  aloud  for  the  energies  of  every 
generation  of  every  class,  bears  no  relation  to  a  long 
filled  up  country  where  the  sign  and  seal  of  the 
leading  class  has  been  to  live  by  other  means  than 
work,  whatever  work,  which  in  Great  Britain  has 
happily  been  immense,  they  may  achieve  gratuit- 
ously. But  leisure,  I  take  it,  is  the  goal  of  every 
member  of  a  complete  civilization.     How  he  spends 


328  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^  COUNTRY 

it  is  wholly  his  own  affair  and  depends  upon  his  natural 
gifts.  His  pleasures  may  be  intellectual,  using  the 
term  broadly,  or  material,  or  very  often  a  happy 
mixture  of  both.  Does  it  much  matter  ?  It  strikes 
the  American  as  remarkable  that  thousands  of  leisured 
and  detached  Englishmen  can  lead  a  life  devoted 
wholly  to  play.  But  a  considerable  proportion  of 
these  very  same  critics  would  be  quite  as  incapable 
of  a  cultured  or  partly  cultured  leisure  as  the  objects 
of  their  strictures,  and  there  is  no  merit  whatever 
in  being  a  stockbroker  or  a  shopkeeper  if  you  can 
live  without  it,  or  in  filling  commercial  situations 
which  unendowed  men  could  fill.  But  the  tradition 
which  cherishes  the  converse  opinion  is  in  America 
a  hardy  plant,  though  contrary  to  the  logic  of  a 
perfected  civilization.  It  is  a  kind  of  religion  that 
the  Almighty  intended  every  bit  of  the  earth's  sur- 
face to  be  made  profitable,  lit  with  electricity  and 
gridironed  with  railroads  as  soon  as  possible — and  that 
every  man  who  stood  aside  was  doing  nothing  to 
further  this  great  end.  This  in  detail  would  probably  be 
deprecated,  but  something  very  like  it  is  at  the  back 
of  the  transatlantic  fetish.  The  local  stimulants 
to  such  a  crude  faith  have  been  singularly  strong. 
When  transferred  to  an  old  country,  however,  it  has 
a  flavour  almost  grotesque  to  the  native  of  any  class, 
and  entirely  incomprehensible.  Yet  it  is  so  plausible, 
and  if  not  exposed  in  its  nakedness  can  be  made 
to  sound  so  wholly  admirable  and  highly  moral. 
But  it  would  be  something  like  a  catastrophe  if  the 
leisured  classes,  in  which  of  course  no  one  would 
include  the  landowners,  the  great  retired,  and  the 
gratuitously  busy,  were  to  be  precipitated  into  the 
crowded  high-class  labour  market  if  they  quali- 
fied themselves  as  the  American  would  have  them 
qualify  to  compete.     They  had  far  better  circulate 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  329 

their  safe  and  happy  incomes  in  frivolous  security 
among  British  industries,  and  make  a  gay  patch  here 
and  there  between  Monday  and  Saturday  when 
everybody  else  is  busy.  Americans  who  have  neither 
cause  nor  desire  to  devote  themselves  to  further  money- 
spinning,  will  tell  you  to  a  man  that  America  is  still 
a  most  uncomfortable  country  for  the  person  who 
wants  to  live  in  its  best  civilization,  i.e.  the  cities, 
and  has  no  office  down  town.  Any  leisured  English- 
man who  has  tried  a  London  suburb  can  doubtless 
guess  what  it  means,  even  without  the  reproach  that 
in  America  is  superadded.  The  change  in  all  this 
is  merely  a  matter  of  time.  The  Western  hustler 
thinks  he  is  ahead  of  things  when  he  preaches  on  his 
favourite  theme,  whereas  in  truth  he  is  only  a  growing 
boy,  and  behind  Europe  in  the  art  of  living  in  this 
sense,  an  achievement  which  is  a  mere  question  of 
time.  Whether  a  majority  of  leisured  Englishmen 
spend  their  leisure  in  a  manner  worthy  of  their 
advantages  and  opportunities  seems  to  me  neither  here 
nor  there  and  altogether  beside  the  question. 

The  real  countryman  of  the  older  States  is  far 
more  unsophisticated  in  matters  outside  his  own 
immediate  environment  than  a  Warwickshire  labourer. 
He  has  not  the  faintest  notion  of  what  like  are 
European  countries  or  peoples,  and  what  is  more,  has 
preconceived  ideas,  gathered  from  antiquated  ill-con- 
structed school  primers  which  are  difficult  to  shake. 
Every  Englishman  familiar  with  the  inside  of  America 
knows  this,  as  it  is  contact  with  himself  that  draws 
forth  these  wondrous  instances  of  ingenuousness ; 
and  any  one  thus  situated  could  give  many  almost 
incredible  examples. 

"  It  must  be  mighty  hard  living  in  England  ",  said 
a  quite  prosperous  freeholder  to  me  one  day.  "  For 
I  reckon  the  queen  (it  was  in  Queen  Victoria's  time) 


330  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

takes  a  tenth  of  all  you  make ".  This  excellent 
person,  I  am  absolutely  certam,  pictured  some  royal 
minion  picking  out  every  tenth  sheaf  from  the  wagons 
at  harvest  -  time.  An  extremely  respectable  but 
absolutely  common  Virginian  farmer,  whose  equally 
common  father  had  owned  nearly  a  hundred  negroes 
all  told,  and  whom  I  knew  very  well,  once  said  to  me, 
"  I  reckon  we  correspond  to  the  British  aristocracy, 
and  the  negroes  (then  mostly  tenants  in  shares)  to 
the  tenant  farmers  !  " 

Excellent  tobacco-chewing,  unshaven,  coUarless, 
innocent  soul.  The  parlour-maid  of  a  big  Lincolnshire 
farmer  of  his  day  would  most  emphatically  if  erro- 
neously have  sent  him  on  sight  round  to  the  back  door 
had  he  rung  the  bell,  and  her  master  could  have  bought 
his  father  out  easily  before  the  war,  negroes  and  all, 
and  continued  to  farm  and  show  up  smartly  turned 
out  in  the  hunting-field  as  before — and  not  greatly 
inconvenienced  ;  while  in  education  and  knowledge  of 
the  world  comparison  would  have  been  ridiculous — I 
mean  with  the  very  frequent  type  I  have  in  mind. 

How  should  it  be  otherwise,  even  among  the  more 
enlightened  untravelled  in  a  country  cut  off  by 
3000  miles  of  ocean  from  all  the  world.  No  natural 
shrewdness  and  intelligence  buried  in  a  country 
district,  remote  from  its  own  seaports  or  great  cities, 
avail  anything.  An  English  peasant  with  the  same 
government  school  education  may  be  slower  and 
duller  in  some  ways,  but  by  comparison  he  is  in  the 
presence  constantly  of  the  highest  civilization  of 
his  own  country,  and  almost  in  sight  of  foreign  ones. 
A  thousand  echoes  from  outside  come  to  his  ears 
that  have  more  meaning  than  they  would  have  for  a 
rustic  of  any  kind  in  Kentucky  or  Ohio.  Even  his 
newspapers  are  not  local,  but  national,  though 
halfpenny  ones.     He  has  probably  near  relations  in 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  331 

Australia,  Canada,  India.  His  village  neighbours  have 
often,  as  soldiers,  sailors,  marines,  been  about  the 
world.  The  great  country  houses  in  his  neighbour- 
hood, filled  with  treasures,  would  astound  the  other 
man,  but  are  familiar  to  him,  so  are  the  smart  cosmo- 
politan sort  of  folks  that  have  come  and  gone 
past  his  door  all  his  life.  He  has  probably  himself 
been  to  London  several  times.  His  children  may  be 
servants  in  more  or  less  big  houses.  In  short,  you 
couldn't  surprise  the  average  English  rustic,  with  all  his 
rusticity,  by  these  things,  and  only  in  a  relative  way  by 
taking  him  to  Paris  or  Berlin.  But  there  are  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  otherwise  intelligent  American  country- 
men who  would  be  dumfounded  if  you  took  them 
merely  round  New  York,  while  as  to  anything  relating 
to  foreign  countries,  they  have  absolutely  no  concep- 
tion, and,  what  is  worse,  they  have  contracted  crude 
superstitions  which  make  their  complacent  ignorance 
seem  even  deeper.  There  is  nothing  strange  about  all 
this.  It  is  simply  inevitable.  But  I  am  not  quite  sure 
that  many  sophisticated  Americans  realise  how  forcibly 
this  strikes  an  alien  who  knows  their  country. 

To  return,  however,  to  this  frequented  high-road 
which  leads  in  time  past  the  picturesque  sheet  of 
water,  beyond  whose  farther  shore  the  well-known 
mansion  of  Guy's  Cliff  rises  in  its  quaint  tiers  of  tower 
and  gable.  Few  houses  that  have  no  years  to  speak  of 
have  achieved  such  a  flavour  of  romance.  There  was 
originally  a  small  chantry  here  which  in  the  Middle 
Ages  was  apparently  re-named  after  Guy  of  Warwick, 
who,  in  spite  of  his  character  as  a  kind  of  genius  loci, 
had  no  existence  in  fact,  but  is  probably  the  hero 
of  an  Anglo-Norman  romance.  The  chantry  at  the 
Dissolution,  with  its  small  endowments,  went  the  way 
of  all  such  things,  and  figured  as  an  inconsiderable 
little  house  and  property,  changing  owners  frequently. 


332  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

In  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  it  came  into 
the  hands  of  some  rich  West  Indians — the  Greatheads 
— and  ultimately  devolved,  through  their  heiress,  on  the 
Percy  family,  Lord  Algernon  being  the  present  owner. 
The  house  is  in  the  main  hardly  a  century  old  and 
owes  its  reputation  in  the  tourist  world  to  its  beautiful 
situation  above  these  leafy  broads  of  the  Avon,  and  to 
its  name.  The  mill  facing  it  is  no  older  than  the  house, 
but  has  achieved  a  venerable  aspect  and  environment 
with  such  remarkable  success  that  when  its  wheel  turns 
on  a  hot  summer's  day,  such  as  the  one  I  encountered 
it  upon,  and  the  cool  water  pours  frothing  into  the 
glassy  lake  beneath  the  spreading  trees,  it  is  good  to 
linger  by,  and  is  in  fact  the  most  picturesqueof  the  many 
and  generally  much  older  mills  for  which  the  Avon  is 
so  justly  famous.  Its  character  as  a  show  mill,  to  be 
sure,  is  rather  painfully  obvious.  Refreshments  and 
postcards  are  in  great  evidence  about  it,  and  as  the 
wheel  revolves,  a  lurking  suspicion  that  it  is  merely 
showing  off  and  doing  its  part  in  the  scene  fixes  itself 
irresistibly  though  perhaps  unjustly  upon  the  mind. 
As  Guy's  Cliff  is  a  private  residence  and  not  a  show 
house,  nor  yet  an  old  one,  it  would  be  irrelevant  to  say 
anything  more  about  it,  with  Kenil worth  ahead  of  us. 

In  regard  to  the  latter  one  may  wonder  how  much 
Scott  has  had  to  do  with  putting  the  public  on  such 
familiar  terms  with  its  name.  There  is  no  ruin  in 
England  frequented  by  such  continuous  flocks  of  people. 
One  is  almost  surprised  to  find  a  town  of  Kenilworth, 
so  utterly  have  the  ruins  filled  the  public  eye.  But  there 
it  is,  and  a  tolerably  long  one,  extending  over  a  mile, 
though  only  one  street  thick.  "  The  King's  Arms  ", 
where  Scott  himself  stayed  in  1820  when  he  came  here  to 
double  the  fame  of  the  castle,  is  still  standing.  The 
latter  is  at  the  far  end  of  the  long  town,  which  has 
a  village  flavour,  rather,  from  end  to  end  and  never 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  333 

once  looks  seriously  town-like,  nor,  one  must  truthfully 
add,  never  once  picturesque.  The  facilities  for  eating 
and  drinking  are  fairly  continuous,  and  I  should  think 
that  the  castle,  if  not  the  chief  industry  of  the  place, 
is  a  leading  one.  It  is  an  odd  reflection  that  the  ruins 
of  a  castle  will  occasionally  support  a  larger  tributary 
population  than  the  same  place  in  the  hey-day  of  its 

glory. 

The    desultory    and    inconsequent -looking    town, 
however,  has  come  to  an  end  before  you  reach  the  castle, 
and  a  sort  of  village  green  takes  its  place,  around  which 
are  more  houses  of  refreshment  and  a  general  sensation 
of  picture  postcards.     As  I  drew  up  to  Kenilworth  1 
could  not  help  thinking  of  Caerphilly,  the  largest  castle 
ruin  in  Wales,  and  its  deserted  look,  half  a  dozen  local 
school -children,  perhaps,  playing  like  ants  among  its 
huge  towers  ;  or  again  of  Norham  upon  Tweed,  with  its 
blood-drenched  turf  ;  or  of  Ludlow,  with  its  resounding 
tales  of  strife.     Kenilworth,  it  is  quite  true,  as  the 
handbooks  tell,  was  one  of  the  most  important  castles 
in  England.     It  was  a  great  centre  and  depot,  coveted 
as  a  trust  by  the  greatest  nobles  in  England,  popular  as 
a  safe  and  central  residence  for  successive  kings.     As  a 
ruin,  exhibiting  on  a  great  and  perfect  scale  the  Norman 
fortress  and  the  Tudor  residence,  it  is  not  surpassed  in 
magnitude, and  yet  one  thinks  somehow, as  onewanders 
about  it  upon  the  green  turf  beneath  the  towering 
red  fragments,  of  successive  centuries  of  pageants  and 
tournaments,  of  functions  and  great  "  house  parties  ", 
if  one  may  use  the  term.     I  should  be  inclined  to  think 
that  Warwickshire  was  the  safest  spot  in  Europe  from 
the  thirteenth  to  the  seventeenth  centuries,  which  is  not 
to  say  that  alarms  were  wholly  absent,  for  there  was 
one  great  siege  of   Kenilworth  in  the  Barons'  War, 
when  the  party  of  Simon  de  Montfort,  after  his  death  at 
Evesham,  defended  themselves  with  valour  and  success. 


334  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

The  site  of  the  castle  had  no  importance  worth 
considering  till  the  time  of  Henry  I,  and  then  its  works 
and  consequence  steadily  increased,  sometimes  under 
royal,    sometimes    under    baronial    ownership.     John 
was  here  frequently,  and  Henry  HI,  with  his  constant 
troubles,  naturally  turned  his  attention  to  Kenilworth 
and  built  extensively,  among  other  things  making  the 
great  lake,  which  was  such  a  feature  both  in  the  defence 
and   adornment    of   the    castle.     In    1244    Simon   de 
Montfort,  first  Earl  of  Leicester,  was  made  governor, 
and  a  few  years  afterwards  the  castle  was  granted  to 
that  famous  person  and  his  wife  for  their  lives.     In 
view  of  coming  troubles  he  had  made  the  great  fortress 
as  secure  as  possible,  and    so  it  became  a  leading 
strategic    point    in   the   campaign   which    ended    the 
earl's  life  on  the  field  of    Evesham.     While  his  son 
was  in  France,  trying  to  raise  reinforcements,  Henry  de 
Hastings  commanded  the  remnant  of  the  de  Montfort 
party  within  the  castle,  who,  animated  perhaps  by 
their  very  despair  of  obtaining  reasonable  conditions, 
held  out  for  two  months  against  every  device,  even  to 
covering  the  lake  with  war  boats,  that  the  besiegers 
could  bring  against  them, securing  in  the  end  a  surrender 
on  honourable  terms.     From  henceforward  Kenilworth 
comes  to  one's  mind  as  a  place  of  feasting  and  pageant, 
varied    occasionally    by    becoming   the   jail-house   of 
some  royal  or  noble  offender.     Edward  II  was  brought 
here  as  prisoner,  and  within  these  walls  resigned  his 
crown.     Almost  every  king  was  here,  keeping  Christmas 
or  Easter,  or  collecting  troops  for  war,  till  Elizabeth 
granted  the  castle  to  her  favourite,  Robert  Dudley, 
Earl  of  Leicester,  who  at  once  set  about  building  on  a 
greater  scale.     He  is  said  to  have  spent  £60,000  in 
these  additions,  an  immense  sum  for  the  period,  and  he 
entertained  the  queen  on  four  different  occasions,  a  fact 
with  which  every  schoolboy,  thanks  to  Scott,  is  familiar 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  335 

or  ought  to  be.  But  his  Amy  Robsart,  who  has  so 
deeply  stirred  our  compassion  and  indignation,  is  not 
the  lady  who  actually  bore  that  name  and  was  also 
Leicester's  wife.  I  remember  being  profoundly  moved 
as  a  boy  on  discovering  what  I  took  to  be  Amy  Robsart's 
paternal  home  in  the  obscure  village  of  Lidcote,  then 
in  my  neighbourhood  on  the  northern  slopes  of  Exmoor 
and  on  the  banks  of  the  Bray,  for  thus  by  name  and 
situation  Scott  took  a  fancy  to  indicate  it. 

But  this  lady  was  not  the  daughter  of  a  knight  of 
Devonshire  but  of  Norfolk,  and  was  publicly  married 
to  Lord  Robert  Dudley,  fifth  son  of  the  Duke  of 
Northumberland  in  the  presence  of  Edward  VI,  in  the 
year  1550,  at  the  age  of  eighteen.  She  seems,  however, 
to  have  lived  for  the  most  part  in  the  country,  while 
her  husband  attended  at  court.  In  1560,  says  the 
late  Mr.  Turner,  the  Warwickshire  antiquary,  she  was 
residing  at  Cumnor  Place,  which  was  rented  from  the 
son  of  Dr.  George  Owen,  who  had  been  physician  to 
Henry  VIII,  and  received  this  church  property  as  a 
grant  at  the  Dissolution.  Staying  with  her  at  the  time 
were  the  owner's  wife  and  another  lady.  On  Sunday, 
8th  September,  all  the  servants  were  sent  to  Abingdon 
Fair,  and  when  they  came  back  their  mistress  was 
discovered  lying  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs  with  her  neck 
broken.  An  inquest  was  held,  but  nothing  transpired 
to  suggest  violence.  Amy,  therefore,  had  been  dead 
many  years  before  the  festivities  at  Kenilworth. 
Leicester,  however,  was  by  that  time  actually  married 
to  Lady  Dduglas  Sheffield,  a  secret  alliance  which  he 
seems  afterwards  to  have  endeavoured  to  repudiate. 
The  last  visit  of  the  queen,  that  of  1575,  lasted  a 
fortnight,  and  was  apparently  the  most  splendid  in 
its  accompaniments.  Bridges  were  built,  the  lake  lit 
up,  while  symbolic  figures  met  her  with  offerings  and 
orations.     There  were  fireworks,  bear  baitings,  Moorish 


336  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARES  COUNTRY 

dancing  and  plays,  and  320  hogsheads  of  beer  alone 
were  consumed.  Leicester's  marriage  arrangements 
were  as  unstable  as  the  rest  of  his  character.  For  in 
the  lifetime  of  his  second  wife  he  married  a  third, 
Lettice,  the  widow  of  Lord  Essex.  And  when  the 
glittering  courtier  died,  or  rather  when  his  brother 
Ambrose,  who  inherited  a  life  interest,  died,  there  was 
great  fighting  over  the  Kenilworth  property  between 
the  representatives  of  the  two  wives,  with  the  result 
that  the  castle  again  went  to  the  Crown.  Charles  I 
was  here  on  his  way  to  Edgehill.  But  during  the 
Protectorate  the  lake  was  run  off  and  the  buildings 
dismantled  and  the  estate  divided  among  Parlia- 
mentary officers.  At  the  Restoration  it  was  granted 
to  Lord  Hyde,  the  historian,  whose  descendants,  the 
Earls  of  Clarendon,  own  it  still. 

That  the  ruins  of  Kenilworth  are  among  the  largest 
and  stateliest  in  England  will  be  readily  understood 
by  a  glance  at  our  artist's  sketch.  The  richness  of 
their  colouring,  too,  adds  no  little  to  their  beauty. 
The  keep,  the  original  portion  built  at  the  end  of  the 
twelfth  century,  is  seen  on  the  right  of  the  picture  and 
is  known  as  C?esar's  Tower.  It  is  a  very  large  four- 
sided  block  of  masonry,  three  stories  high,  and  flanked 
at  each  angle  with  massive  towers.  Higher  up  the 
slope  to  the  west  most  of  the  buildings  are  two  centuries 
later,  reared  in  place  of  earlier  ones,  and  among  them 
are  the  remains  of  the  great  hall.  Opposite  Caesar's 
Tower  and  on  the  south  side,  conspicuous  with  its 
Tudor  windows,  is  the  large  block  of  buildings  built 
by  Leicester  and  named  after  him.  The  outer  walls 
of  the  great  court,  as  will  be  seen,  are  fairly  perfect. 
Beyond  them  lie  the  meadows  which  formed  the 
bottom  of  the  great  lake  which,  till  the  Commonwealth, 
extended  round  two  sides  of  the  castle,  and  the  extent 
of  which  can  be  easily  traced  as  you  stand  on  the 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  337 

walls  of  the  higher  raised  western  portion  of  the 
ruins. 

Though  Kenilworth  has  nothing  like  the  martial 
record  of  many  castles  of  far  less  size  and  fame,  its 
intimate  associations  with  so  many  sovereigns,  their 
triumphs  and  their  trials,  give  ample  food  for  reflection 
as  one  wanders  around  the  intricate  mass  of  stately 
red  ruins,  here  perfect  to  the  height  of  their  vanished 
battlements,  there  little  more  than  the  foundations  of 
chambers  once  echoing  to  the  sounds  of  life  and  gaiety. 
What  would  one  give  to  listen  for  half  an  hour  to  the 
table-talk  in  the  great  banqueting-hall  in  the  days, 
let  us  say,  of  Henry  VII,  or  again  in  those  of  Robert 
Dudley;  to  the  tones  of  voice  and  accent, the  subjects  of 
conversation,  the  external  attitude  of  men  and  women 
to  one  another,  and  a  thousand  things  to  which  the 
contemporary  pen  can  give  us  no  clue.  I  fancy  there 
would  be  a  good  many  surprises  in  store  !  The  pageant 
manager  of  to-day  may  reproduce  the  dresses,  but 
anything  else,  ah,  who  can  say,  I  have  my  doubts  that 
any  of  us  could  get  near  the  atmosphere  of  these 
ancients  or  their  point  of  view. 

There  is  little  doubt  but  that  a  hundred  subtleties 
of  manner,  tricks,  expression,  intonation,  that  go  to 
differentiate  one  type  from  another  have  been  lost 
and  replaced  by  fresh  ones.  We  can  really  form  no 
notion  how  the  most  cultivated  type  of  Elizabethan 
Englishman  spoke.  We  know  more  or  less  the  words 
he  used,  but  as  to  tones  or  emphases,  with  which  he 
gave  expression  to  them,  all  is  darkness.  Of  course 
we  do  know  that  a  certain  number  of  old  English 
words  retain  their  original  meaning  in  the  rural  districts 
of  the  older  States  of  America  :  "  Well,  I  do  admire  " 
for  "  Well,  I  am  surprised  "  (North  Carolina),  a  covey 
of  partridges  or  any  wild  things,  "  using  in  "  {i.e.  habit- 
ually frequenting)  a  certain  field,  an  archaism  found 


338  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

in  seventeenth  century  literature.  "  Clever  ",  again, 
for  genial  or  agreeable  ;  "  I  am  right  glad  ",  or,  "  I  am 
mighty  sorry  ",  and  many  more.  I  have  often  amused 
myself  by  wondering  how  many,  too,  of  certain  small 
subtle  differences  of  manner,  habit,  and  attitude,  out- 
side those  obviously  due  to  different  circumstances 
and  climate,  among  the  Virginians,  for  instance, 
being  good  subjects  for  comparison,  may  not  be 
survivals  of  the  English  generations  that  mainly 
sent  them  out.  England  in  such  matters  has  been 
always  changing  and  readily  susceptible  to  influences 
from  its  social  and  commercial  centres.  Virginia, 
on  the  other  hand,  till  quite  recently  was  a  pro- 
vincial community  absolutely  isolated  from  all  the 
world.  It  had  very  little  intercourse  with  the  mother- 
country  after  the  first  three  or  four  generations,  and 
received  practically  no  immigration.  So  its  people 
could  scarcely  have  picked  up  anything  of  this  kind 
between  the  seventeenth  century  and  the  middle 
of  the  nineteenth.  At  any  rate,  to  those  who  know 
England  with  the  intimacy  of  a  native,  and  one  of 
these  old  States  with  the  intimacy  of  some  years, 
there  is  a  wonderful  field  of  interest  and  scope  for 
speculation.  But  to  how  small  a  number  have  circum- 
stances given  this  exceptional  opportunity,  and  of 
those  few  how  many  have  either  the  equipment  or  the 
desire  to  pursue  it. 

Stoneleigh  Abbey  has  been  the  property  of  Lord 
Leigh  and  of  his  ancestors  since  the  sixteenth  century, 
and  lies  on  the  Avon,  but  a  mile  or  two  from  Kenil- 
worth.  The  stream,  however,  is  now  such  a  small 
one  that  it  would  be  more  in  order  to  say  that  the 
Avon  meandered  through  the  deer  park.  It  does 
this,  too,  with  more  life  and  buoyancy  than  in  any 
part  of  its  natural  course  known  to  me,  running  over 
gravelly  rapids  into  lively  pools,  and  swishing  under 


WARWICK  AND  KENILWORTH  339 

the  hollow  roots  of  pendant  oaks  with  almost  the 
vivacity  of  a  Herefordshire  grayling  stream.  The 
present  mansion  is  a  large  oblong  building  of  about 
the  year  1700,  in  the  Italian  style.  As  its  affix 
implies,  Stoneleigh  was  church  property  and  was  sold 
by  the  grantee  to  Sir  Thomas  Leigh  and  Sir  Rowland 
Hill,  London  merchants  and  aldermen,  and  both 
Shropshire  men,  though  the  family  of  the  former  were 
emigrants  thither  from  the  better  known  Cheshire 
clan.  However,  Sir  Thomas  Leigh  not  only  got  his 
share  of  Stoneleigh,  but  married  the  other  share  in 
the  person  of  Sir  Rowland's  niece  and  heiress,  getting 
a  great  deal  more  besides.  The  old  abbey  buildings 
were  in  great  part  demolished,  and  such  as  remain 
have  been  for  the  most  part  converted  into  offices. 
The  village  and  church  stand  about  a  mile  from  the 
lodge,  and  the  road  thither  crosses  the  Avon  by  a 
remarkable  and  quaint  old  fourteenth  century  bridge, 
built,  it  is  said,  by  the  monks  of  Stoneleigh,  and  thence 
beneath  an  avenue  of  extremely  imposing  and  ancient 
trees.  Stoneleigh,  unlike  so  many  parishes  in  this 
neighbourhood,  has  still  its  ancient  church  with  a 
partly  Norman  tower,  a  decorated  nave,  and  a  Norman 
chancel,  on  the  north  side  of  which  is  a  mortuary 
chapel  of  the  Leigh  family.  In  the  chancel  is  a  large 
marble  monument  to  Alice,  Duchess  Dudley,  and 
her  daughter  Alicia.  The  former  was  a  daughter 
of  Sir  Thomas  Leigh,  first  owner  here,  and  married 
the  son  of  Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of  Leicester.  Charles  I 
created  her  a  duchess  and  she  lived  to  be  ninety. 
But  the  Avon  has  now  shrunk  to  so  modest  a  stream, 
that  neither  the  exigencies  of  space  nor  the  fact  that, 
with  the  single  undermentioned  exception,  very  little 
of  interest  gathers  about  its  sequestered  banks,  need 
be  pleaded  for  cone  hi  ding  our  pilgrimage  at  Rugby. 


CHAPTER  XII 
RUGBY 

THE  fact  of  Rugby  School  being  seated  upon  Shake- 
speare's Avon,  though  nine  people  out  of  ten 
will  most  probably  be  surprised  to  hear  it,  provides 
an  opportunity  for  saying  something  concerning  the 
story  of  a  school  whose  fame  in  America,  outside,  at  any 
rate, a  small,  travelled,and  cosmopolitan  circle,  stands  or 
used  to  stand  next  to  Eton  or  vaguely  coupled  with  it. 
Constantly  in  my  own  experience  they  were  the  only 
two  great  English  schools  known  even  by  name  across 
the   Atlantic.     Sometimes   Rugby   was   actually   the 
only  one.     This  of  course  is  due  to  Arnold,  though 
mainly,  it  must  be  admitted,  to  Arnold,  as  he  and  Rugby 
appear  through  the  medium  of  the  immortal  pages  of 
"  Tom  Brown  ".     So  Americans  at  least  are,  I  know, 
interested  in  Rugby,  and  may  perhaps,  as  well  as  some 
others,  appreciate  a  brief  relation  of   its   rise  from 
obscurity  to  fame.     While  English  readers  are  more 
familiar  with  the  actual  position  of  Rugby  as  one  of  the 
higher  group  of  old  public  schools,  they  too  may  have 
some  touch  of  curiosity  to  know  how  it  grew,  fortuit- 
ously, as  it  were,  to  be  so.     Its  development  in  this 
respect  was  similar  to  that  of  Harrow,  and  Harrow  alone, 
though  not  quite  so  conspicuous  in  a  social  way,  nor  so 
rapid  in  point  of  numbers,  as  John  Lyons's  foundation, 
which  had  the  advantage  of  a  singularly  healthy  and 
at  that  time  picturesque  situation  near  the  metropolis. 
Harrow  was  appealing  to  the  rich  merchants  of 


RUGBY  341 

London  and  the  aristocracy  of  the  country,  in  rivalry 
with  Eton  and  Westminster  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
when  Rugby  was  attracting  only  the  squires  and  the 
like  of  the  Midlands.  Many  other  grammar  schools 
in  their  several  districts  were  then,  to  be  sure,  doing 
very  much  the  same,  but  none,  I  think,  went  quite 
so  far  afield.  Shrewsbury,  later  on,  by  two  brilliant 
teachers,  attracted  clever  boys  from  far  counties,  but 
the  school  remained  otherwise  comparatively  small, 
cramped,  and  ill-equipped. 

Most  of  the  other  well-known  grammar  schools 
acquired  little  more  than  provincial  reputations. 
Many  of  them  have  since  collapsed  ;  others  remain 
useful  middle-class  schools.  A  few  have  blossomed 
out  into  flourishing  public  schools  of  the  modern  type, 
and  have  the  consolation  of  their  age  for  home  con- 
sumption, though  the  world  knows  or  cares  little  about 
their  antiquity.  It  esteems  them  merely  as  good 
public  schools,  a  little  way  behind  the  greater  Victorian 
schools,  founded  largely  on  the  model  of  Rugby  which 
got  in  ahead  of  them  and  became  powerful,  well- 
equipped,  and  influential,  while  they  were  struggling 
out  of  the  grammar-school  stage.  Rugby,  however, 
•'  found  itself  "  long  before  this,  and  has  now  the 
secure  reputation  not  merely  of  being  a  great  but 
an  ancient  public  school  in  the  world's  esteem.  A 
would-be  knowledgeable  person  will  sometimes  venture 
the  assertion  that  Rugby  was  not  a  public  school  till 
Arnold's  time,  but  this  would  only  be  because  he  did 
not  know  quite  enough.  Arnold  of  course  lifted  Rugby 
into  the  first  rank,  but  it  was  a  school  with  something 
of  a  national  clientele,  a  social  one  too,  not  mainly 
based  on  teaching  grounds  like  Shrewsbury,  long  before 
Arnold.  In  this  particular  it  has  a  place  to  itself 
historically.  It  followed  in  the  steps  of  Harrow  till 
Arnold's  day.     It  had  never  equalled  Harrow  in  general 


342  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

distinction  or  in  average  numbers,  but  it  approached  it 
much  nearer  than  any  other  expanded  grammar  school ; 
and  then,  eighty  years  ago,  at  a  lean  period  of  public- 
schoolrepute,made  such  a  tremendous  all-round  reputa- 
tion that  everything  concerning  it,  including  its  ante- 
cedents, got  something  of  a  halo,  and  one  that  abides. 
Eton,  Westminster, and  Winchester  asgreat  mediaeval 
foundations  for  a  large  number  of  "  poor  scholars  ",  i.e. 
poor  gentlemen  mostly,  were  national  institutions  of 
stable  fortunes,  only  dependent  on  the  caprice  of  the 
more  wealthy  for  such  further  prosperity  and  reputa- 
tion as  then  accrued  from  the  patronage  of  liberally 
paying  non-foundationers.  The  two  first,  as  every  one 
knows,  became  the  aristocratic  schools  of  England, 
rivalled  as  early  as  the  mid-eighteenth  century  by  the 
once  obscure  grammar  school  on  Harrow  Hill.  Win- 
chester, socially  unexceptionable,  but  hardly  "  aristo- 
cratic "  in  the  same  sense,  for  some  mysterious  reason, 
and  always  limited  in  numbers  by  circumstances,  held 
its  own  in  other  respects  as  inferior  to  none.  One  must 
banish  from  the  mind  the  present  state  of  things  in 
counting  the  small  group  of  public  schools,  already 
enumerated,  into  which  Rugby  won  its  way.  For  the 
ancient  London  day-schools  were  little  more  than 
teaching  shops,  and  though  labelled  in  Blue  books  for 
technical  reasons  "  public  schools  ",  with  the  exception 
of  the  old  Charterhouse,  which  fluctuated  prodigiously, 
had  nothing  of  the  public-school  atmosphere,  as  we 
understand  it,  about  them,  nor  yet  any  social  kudos 
whatsoever.  With  the  present  large  number  of  public 
schools,  subtly  graded  beyond  a  doubt,  but  in  every 
way  meriting  that  indefinable  but  well  understood 
term,  the  situation  has  completely  altered.  Every 
well-to-do  parent^n^^England,  though  he  may  some- 
times have  misgivings  on  practical  accounts,  for  his 
own  reputation  (one  might  almost  put  it  this  way  !) 


RUGBY  343 

and  always  as  a  necessary  social  equipment  for  his 
son,  feels  that  a  public  school  is  indispensable.  But  I 
am  quite  sure  that  very  many  English  public-school 
men  themselves  entirely  forget,  if  they  ever  knew, 
how  very  modern  all  this  prestige  of  a  public-school 
education  is.  Before  Dr.  Arnold's  time,  approximately 
speaking,  there  was  almost  none  of  it.  Many  of  the 
highly  placed  considered  Eton  or  Westminster  too 
rough  and  democratic  assemblages  for  their  precious 
heirs,  who  had  tutors  till  they  went,  much  younger 
than  now,  to  the  university.  The  squires  and  pro- 
fessional classes  allied  with  them  had  many  objections — 
transportation,  political  and  religious  convictions,  and 
so  forth.  Inshort,  a  distinct  minority  of  the  prosperous 
classes,  and  not  perhaps  without  reason,  approved  of 
public  schools.  So  the  youth  who  entered  the  university 
or  the  army,  say  in  the  time  of  the  Napoleon  wars, 
without  such  antecedents,  experienced  nothing  what- 
ever of  the  almost  uncomfortable  singularity  which  now 
attaches  to  him,  for  most  of  his  contemporaries  were 
in  the  same  boat.  Whether  he  rode  his  pony  daily 
into  Warwick  or  Stratford  grammar  schools,  or  was 
the  torment  of  a  domestic  tutor,  his  field  sports  were 
no  bad  alternative  perhaps  for  the  sort  of  pastime  that 
then  filled  the  leisure  hours  of  most  public-schools  boys 
at  the  time  of  Waterloo  and  before.  Even  so,  no  doubt, 
he  missed  a  good  deal  in  some  ways,  though  he  was 
spared  in  others ;  but  then  fashion  was  much  divided 
upon  this  point,  which  makes  all  the  difference. 
When  the  first  of  a  swarm  of  near  relatives  of  the 
present  writer  went  to  Rugby  twenty  years  after 
Waterloo,  there  was  much  misgiving  and  fluttering 
in  the  dovecotes,  and  remonstrances  poured  in  from 
well-meaning  friends,  though  Rugby  was  beginning  to 
be  famous.  For  not  quite  the  same  reason  a  lady, 
whom  I  can  well  remember  in  her  old  age,  burst  into 


344  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

tears  when  her  first-born  and  afterwards  distinguished 
son  won  a  scholarship  at  Winchester,  so  terrible  was 
the  reputation  for  everything  that  wrings  a  mother's 
heart  at  that  then  Spartan  school. 

Now  Laurence  Sherriff,  alderman  of  London  and 
grocer  by  appointment  to  Her  Majesty  Queen  Elizabeth, 
was  a  native  of  Rugby  who  had  gone  up  to  London  as 
an  obscure  youth  and  made  some  fame  and  a  most 
substantial  fortune.  He  was  granted  a  coat  of  arms 
in  1559,  and  inhabited  a  well-appointed  mansion  in 
Newgate  known  as  the  "  King's  Grocer's  House ". 
With  a  proper  affection  for  his  native  town,  he  set 
apart  in  his  will  £100  for  the  founding  of  a  free 
school  and  almshouse  there,  and  even  took  some  steps 
towards  its  inauguration.  A  little  later,  and  only  three 
weeks  before  his  death  in  1567,  he  altered  this  legacy 
to  a  third  interest  in  Conduit  Close,  a  field  of  some 
24  acres,  adjoining  the  city  of  London  in  the 
district  its  still  familiar  name  sufficiently  indicates. 
This  alteration,  of  small  moment  at  the  time  and 
intended  as  an  equivalent  for  the  other,  not  as  a  greater 
benefaction,  was  the  making  of  Rugby  School.  There 
was  no  particular  financial  increment  in  a  mere  hundred 
pounds.  But  the  Conduit  Close  property,  then  worth 
in  all  about  £60  a  year,  grew  in  a  few  generations 
to  be  worth  nearly  two  hundred  times  as  much. 
There  was  also  a  charge  on  some  property  at  Browns- 
over  of  £16  a  year.  Besides  this,  a  house  in 
Rugby  belonging  to  the  donor  was  given  to  the 
Trust  as  a  master's  lodging ;  also  £50  in  money  to 
build  a  schoolroom  and  quarters  for  four  poor  men, 
who  were  to  have  sevenpence  a  week  for  maintenance. 
The  salary  of  the  master  was  £12  per  annum,  and 
he  was  to  be  a  Master  of  Arts  if  possible.  Thus 
was  Rugby  School  founded,  not  differing  essentially 
in  scale,  method,  and  motive  from  a  hundred  other 


«  RUGBY  345 

country  grammar  schools.  It  was  intended  for  the 
free  education  of  the  boys  of  Rugby  and  Brownsover, 
the  former,  with  a  population  then  of  about  500, 
not  being  so  vastly  greater  than  its  now  obscure 
neighbour,  under  the  title  of  The  Free  School  and 
Almshouses  of  Laurence  Sherriff  of  London,  grocer. 
The  benevolent  grocer,  man  of  commercial  distinction 
and  weight  though  he  undoubtedly  was  in  the  city  of 
London,  committed  one  serious  oversight  in  this 
comparatively,  as  it  might  seem,  small  undertaking. 
He  appointed,  to  be  sure,  two  admirable  trustees, 
intimate  friends,  substantial  and  upright  men,  but 
without  further  provision  at  their  death.  The  charge 
became  in  a  fashion  hereditary,  and  the  inevitable 
happened.  Unscrupulous  heirs  began  to  apply  the 
gradually  increasing  funds  to  their  own  use,  to  starve 
the  master  and  neglect  the  buildings  which  were 
nobody's  business, — lawsuits  took  place,  commissions 
of  inquiry  were  appointed,  and  it  became  a  chronic 
struggle  to  drag  the  money,  or  part  of  it,  out  of  the 
hands  of  those  who  held  the  property  charged  with  the 
school  income.  All  kinds  of  frauds  were  attempted 
or  perpetrated.  In  spite  of  this,  prior  to  the 
Civil  War,  many  good  masters  had  occupied  Laurence 
Sherriff' s  modest  schoolhouse,  and  a  good  few  of  their 
boys  had  proceeded  to  the  universities.  The  financial 
troubles  and  trials  of  the  school,  in  spite  of  new  trustees 
who  did  practically  nothing,  are  curious  reading.  The 
inhabitants  of  the  town  seem  at  this  period  to  have 
chosen  the  master,  who  in  his  turn  had  to  fight  the  heirs 
of  Laurence  Sherriff  for  his  princely  salary.  Ultimately 
the  scandal  waxed  so  serious  that  the  chief  of  these 
unfaithful  stewards  was  prosecuted  to  a  successful 
conviction,  flung  into  prison,  and  made  to  disgorge 
£250.  Meanwhile  the  almshouses  created  infinite 
rivalry  among  the  citizens,  who  occasionally  came  to 


346  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

blows  in  forcing  their  respective  nominees  into  a 
vacancy.  A  local  squire,  whose  descendants  are  still  in 
situ,  seems  to  have  practically  controlled  the  charity 
for  a  long  time  during  the  seventeenth  century ;  a 
dependent  of  his  own,  an  able-bodied  youth  of 
twenty,  among  others  being  quartered  there  as  a 
pensioner  for  several  years.  But,  with  all  this,  things 
advanced  steadily,  if  slowly.  A  new  generation  of 
trustees  did  their  duty,  and  it  is  curious  to  note  that 
the  Leighs  of  Stoneleigh,  who  have  been  so  active  in 
modern  times  among  the  school's  governors,  were  at  the 
Restoration  practically  the  nominators  of  the  head 
master.  William  Holyoak,  one  of  the  Magdalen  fellows 
ejected  by  James  1 1,  gave  Rugby  its  first  outside  reputa- 
tion. The  school  rose  to  over  a  hundred,  and  many 
additions  for  boarders  with  other  improvements  were 
made.  A  list  of  noblemen  and  baronets  educated  there 
is  extant,  while  many  less  socially  exalted  Rugbeians 
acquired  fame.  Speech  day  then  first  became  an  im- 
portant local  function,  celebrated  in  a  playhouse  which 
the  town  boasted  of,  and  several  of  the  pieces  recited 
there  are  preserved,  while  the  boys  also  entertained  the 
neighbourhood  with  dramatic  performances.  Holyoak 
reigned  for  forty  years.  His  income  had  grown  to  £70, 
but  boarders  were  of  course  now  numerous,  while  the 
trustees  so  greatly  honoured  him  that  he  was  allowed 
to  hold  several  livings,  and  when  he  died  he  bequeathed 
hislibrary  tothe  school.  With  a  normal  interval  another 
brilliant  master,  one  Crossfield,  was  appointed,  and  in 
the  year  1743  fifty  new  boys  were  entered. 

The  school  was  now  bursting  its  old  bounds.  The 
original  schoolhouse,  which  is  said  to  have  resembled 
that  now  well-known  one  at  Stratford,  was  condemned 
by  the  architects,  and  so  it  was  decided  to  move.  The 
London  property,  now  covered  with  buildings,  had  so 
increased  that  £2000  was  easily  raised  upon  it.     The 


RUGBY  347 

manor  house  of  Rugby,  with  garden,  fields,  and  farm, 
occupying  the  site  of  the  present  school  at  the  fringe  of 
the  town,  was  purchased  and  adapted  sufficiently  for 
the  moment.  The  new  Rugby  School  opened  in  1750, 
and  the  famous  "  Close  ",  developed  from  the  enclosed 
paddocks  of  the  manor  farm,  came  into  use,  being  for 
some  time  known  as  "  Paradise  ".  At  the  old  school, 
the  churchyard,  the  playground  for  the  parish  youth, 
it  must  be  remembered,  in  those  days  throughout 
England  and  Wales,  was  the  sole  athletic  arena  of  the 
Rugby  boy.  No  further  progress  was  made  till  1778, 
when  Dr.  James,  an  Etonian  and  King's  scholar,  took 
the  reins  and  lifted  Rugby  up  yet  another  stage.  This 
accomplished  man  remodelled  the  school  upon  Etonlines 
— tutors,  fags,  pr^epositors,  Eton  books,  and  all  the  rest 
of  it.  A  good  deal  of  building  and  re-adapting  was  done 
too.  Among  other  things,  separate  form  rooms  were 
created,  while  several  dames'  boarding-houses  also 
sprangintobeing,andthenumbersofboyswentupto250. 
Though  Rugby  was  the  resort  most  obviously  of 
the  prosperous  classes,  particularly  the  squires'  sons 
of  the  Midland  counties,  it  is  interesting  to  note  that 
£30  a  year  was  the  total  annual  cost  of  a  boy.  Of 
this  only  sixteen  guineas  was  charged  for  board,  with  a 
trifle  extra  for  a  study  !  James,  in  his  letters,  doubts 
if  the  schoolhouse  covers  expenses.  In  half  a  century 
this  figure  had  trebled  at  least.  The  historian  of 
Rugby  School,  from  of  course  abundant  documentary 
evidence,  gives  us  many  glimpses  of  the  Rugby  boy 
of  this  last  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Nimrod  the  famous  sporting  writer,  with  Macready 
the  actor  and  others,  have  described  at  more  or  less 
length  their  Rugby  days.  Nimrod  (Apperley)  for 
four  years  shared  a  study  with  Samuel  Butler  the 
brilliant  scholar  and  afterwards  famous  head  master 
of   Shrewsbury.     According  to   his   friend,  he  spent 


348  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

most  of  his  time  reading  novels  or  fishing,  but 
in  form  electrified  his  companions  and  delighted 
the  head  master  with  his  rendering  of  the  classics. 
Public -school  boys  for  the  most  part  in  those  days 
pursued  their  home  amusements  with  the  inevitable 
result  and  further  zest  of  constant  poaching  rows. 
Fishing  in  the  Avon  with  rod,  night-line,  or  casting- 
net  seems  to  have  been  a  favourite  pastime  at  Rugby. 
A  common  duty  of  the  earlier  fags  was  to  rise  betimes 
and  run  a  mile  or  two  into  the  country  to  examine 
their  master's  night-line.  There  was  no  football,  but 
Nimrod  tells  us  that  cricket  was  in  high  repute,  and 
never  had  he  seen  neater  batters  or  surer  bowlers 
than  some  of  his  schoolfellows,  though  he  had  watched, 
he  says,  some  of  the  best  performers  of  his  day.  When 
coaching  approached  its  zenith,  the  sporting  instinct 
of  the  Rugby  boy  responded  ardently  within  his 
narrow  bounds.  Rude  conveyances  were  contrived 
by  the  school  carpenter,  and  the  mighty  of  the  com- 
munity drove  long  teams  of  fags  about  the  country, 
not  sparing,  we  may  be  sure,  the  lash.  There  was 
much  house  rivalry,  we  are  told,  as  to  the  merits  of 
the  respective  teams.  Some  boys  kept  guns  surrepti- 
tiously, like  Sir  Robert  Peel  at  Harrow.  Others,  Dr. 
James  complained,  got  his  horses  out  sometimes  by 
stealth  and  lamed  them  over  fences.  The  external 
appearance  of  the  Rugby  boy  of  that  period  is  pre- 
sented to  us  as  tricked  out  in  a  stiff  hat,  with  band  or 
buckle,  waistcoat  of  scarlet  cloth,  knee-breeches  of 
wash-leather,  doeskin,  or  nankeen,  with  worsted 
or  silk  stocking  and  buckled  shoes.  Muslin  cravats 
were  worn,  and  in  bed  the  universal  nightcap.  At 
least  a  week  was  occupied  in  assembling  and  dis- 
missing the  school  at  the  beginning  and  end  of  the 
half-year  —  the  latter  period  occupied  in  breaking 
windows    and    drinking    unlimited    punch.     A    long 


RUGBY  349 

list  of  distinguished  names  are  placed  to  the  credit 
of  James  who,  after  sixteen  years,  retired  to  the  living 
of  Upton-on-Severn.  Rugby  was  now  established 
as  next  to  the  four  senior  schools,  though  Charter- 
house, in  its  East-end  environment,  is  rather  difficult 
to  place.  It  makes  no  difference  that  under  Ingles, 
another  Eton  and  King's  man,  the  school  lost  in 
numbers,  for  the  older  schools  also  fluctuated 
amazingly.  Ingles,  though  of  high  attainments  and 
character,  was  a  dismal  and  severe  person,  and  a  serious 
rebellion  occurred  in  his  time.  Masters  were  barred 
out  and  bonfires  made  of  the  school  desks,  after 
which  the  boys  retired  to  the  "  Island  "  in  the  Close, 
the  moat  around  it  being  in  those  days  full  of  water. 
Pursued  by  special  constables,  townsmen,  and  farmers, 
and  the  Riot  Act  read,  it  was  not  till  some  soldiers 
were  called  in  who  waded  the  moat  that  these  young 
rebels  surrendered  at  discretion,  to  experience  a  very 
orgy  of  castigation  !  In  the  Napoleon  wars  a  large 
number  of  Rugbeians  gained  high  distinction,  and 
during  the  invasion-scares,  when  local  volunteers 
were  everywhere  organizing,  the  boys  formed  two 
strong  companies.  Uniformed  in  blue  lapelled  coats 
with  scarlet  facings,  and  armed  with  wooden  broad- 
swords, they  naturally,  for  lack  of  an  alien  foe,  in- 
dulged in  internecine  strife,  and  the  "  Island  "  was 
once  more  the  scene  of  attack  and  defence. 

In  1806  Arnold's  immediate  predecessor  was  ap- 
pointed. It  is  curious  to  note  that  on  this  occasion 
Samuel  Butler,  who,  with  his  successor  Kennedy, 
gave  Shrewsbury  two  generations  of  scholastic  dis- 
tinction, was  a  candidate,  and  still  more  curious  that 
though  an  old  Rugbeian  with  a  statutory  prior  right 
was  passed  over,  as  is  supposed,  for  his  over-severity 
upon  the  banks  of  the  Severn.  John  Wool],  "  a  perfect 
gentleman    and   disciplinarian ",   and   now   preferred 


350  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

to  Butler,  was  an  Oxonian  Wykehamist  and  arrived 
at  Rugby  in  a  tandem,  a  postilion  mounted  on  the 
leader.  The  new  chief  was  in  all  ways  a  success.  The 
numbers  rose  to  381,  making  Rugby  the  second  largest 
of  the  public  schools,  and  there  were  nine  assistant 
masters,  about  the  usual  proportion  at  that  period. 
And  this  is  worth  noting,  in  view  of  a  vague  popular 
delusion  that,  prior  to  Arnold,  Rugby  was  only  a 
well-known  grammar  school.  In  the  cast  of  a  play 
performed  by  the  boys  in  1807,  with  Macready  as  the 
star,  nearly  all  the  actors  made  their  mark  in  various 
paths  of  life.  Macready  himself,  with  a  friend,  on  one 
occasion  hired  a  chaise  and  drove  all  the  way  to 
Leicester  to  see  Richard  III  acted,  and  got  back  in 
time  for  first  school,  apparently  undetected. 

But  the  great  event  of  Wooll's  reign,  in  a  material 
sense,  was  the  almost  entire  rebuilding  of  the  school, 
a  work  commenced  in  1808.  James  had  been 
crowded  even  in  his  time,  and  put  to  a  good  many 
temporary  shifts  to  house  his  numerous  forms.  The 
trustees  had  now  accumulations  amounting  to  ;^40,ooo, 
and  their  income  besides  was  £3500  a  year  from 
property.  The  new  buildings — cloistered,  towered, 
and  turreted, — in  the  main  such  as  the  visitor  now 
sees,  took  six  years  in  building.  The  homely  pre- 
decessor to  the  present  chapel  was  also  erected.  The 
Close,  hitherto  still  hedged  with  paddocks,  was  thrown 
into  the  8  acres  now  known  as  Old  Bigside ;  the 
noble  elms,  so  shattered  by  the  storms  at  the  close  of 
the  last  century,  left  to  mark  in  part  the  line  of  the 
old  hedgerows.  Other  alterations,  not  material  here, 
took  place  then  and  later.  The  year  of  Waterloo 
roughly  coincides  with  this  new  epoch  in  the  life  of 
Rugby.  The  boys  themselves  took  an  active  part 
in  levelling  the  Close  for  cricket  and  incidentally  for 
football,  which  had  by  no  means  developed  into  the 


RUGBY  351 

famous  game  of  later  days,  indeed  very  far  from  it. 
As  recalled  by  a  Rugbeian,  well  remembered  by 
hundreds  of  still  middle-aged  men,  running  with  the 
ball,  the  essence  of  the  after  game  was  distinctly 
tabooed.  The  origin,  according  to  the  same  eye- 
witness, of  a  sport  that  has  now  encompassed  the 
world  was  the  reckless  defiance  of  this  rule  by  a  single 
youth,  who  rushed  forward  with  the  ball  under  his 
arm  and  set  or  inspired  the  revolution.  In  Wooll's 
day  football  at  Rugby  was  merely  the  desultory 
game,  with  a  strong,  pugnacious,  and  personal  signifi- 
cance, that  it  was  at  the  other  great  schools,  and  in  a 
less  serious  fashion  at  grammar  schools.  Two  leaders 
picked  up  sides  in  the  old  manner,  and  when  individ- 
uality had  ceased  to  count,  the  rank  and  file,  or  the 
fags  who  chose  to  play,  were  parted  in  wholesale 
fashion.  The  top  hats  and  coats  were  laid  in  a  heap, 
and  the  game  was  played  till  the  school  bell  rang, 
summoning  not  only  the  combatants  but  a  yet  greater 
number,  probably  from  more  distant  fields  of  enter- 
prise, associated  with  fish  and  game  and  also  public- 
houses.  For  the  young  Briton  then  always  liked 
his  beer  and  very  often  his  punch,  as  his  seniors  en- 
joyed their  port  without  apology.  Their  descendants 
may  or  may  not  suffer  for  it,  but  there  is  no  evidence 
that  they  were  themselves  anaemic  or  effete  either 
then  or  afterwards.  The  fighting  power  of  Great 
Britain  was  then  at  its  zenith.  In  great  achievement 
and  prestige  the  little  island,  with  its  few  millions 
of  souls,  offered  a  spectacle  such  as  the  world  had 
never  seen,  and  Rugbeians  were  already  playing  by 
no  means  inconspicuous  parts  in  the  drama.  It 
must  have  been  a  fine  thing  to  be  a  Briton  in  those 
days — conqueror  of  the  ocean  by  seamanship  and 
bulldog  courage  ;  on  land  the  only  soldiers  that 
Napoleon  recognized  as  equals,  man  for  man,  with  his 


352  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

own  inspired  battalions.  The  formidable  Englishman 
of  Napoleon's  vision  was  altogether  another  sort  of 
being,  it  is  to  be  feared,  from  the  self-absorbed,  luxu- 
riousgame-playing,  slightly  hysterically  degenerate,  that 
appears  to  fill  the  hopeful  eyes  of  our  future  conquerors. 
But  the  Rugby  boys,  when  Englishmen  were  at  a 
high  premium  in  the  world,  as  I  have  said,  drank 
punch  and  beer  like  their  seniors,  and  fought  sanguinary 
battles  under  the  rules  of  the  prize-ring,  and  did  all 
sorts  of  heinous  things  that  would  scandalize  the  less 
developed  modem  youth,  whose  life's  ambition  for  the 
moment  is  most  likely  centred  on  his  house  eleven. 
In  a  boy's  school  life  nowadays  no  test  of  his  physical 
courage  worthy  of  mention  is  ever  once  applied.  That 
went  out  with  the  abolition  of  fighting,  of  severe 
caning,  and  of  serious  legalized  hacking  at  the  Rugby 
game  of  football,  in  the  sixties,  speaking  broadly,  at  all 
English  schools.  The  fifth  of  November  could  hardly 
have  found  a  more  appropriate  place  of  celebration 
than  Rugby,  seeing  that  the  conspirators  and  their 
friends  and  sympathizers  assembled,  as  it  will  be  re- 
membered, in  the  town  and  neighbouring  heath  of 
Dunsmuir  to  await  the  crisis.  Ferocious  fights  between 
the  town  and  the  boys  took  place  regularly  over  the 
ignition  of  the  great  bonfire  that  was  piously  laid 
by  the  townspeople.  The  point  contested  here  was 
definite  enough.  The  match  was  not  applied  in  the 
ordinary  course  till  evening,  after  the  school  "  locking 
up  ".  The  object  of  the  boys  was  to  light  the  bonfire 
prematurely,  while  they  were  still  at  large  and  could 
enjoy  the  blaze.  With  the  fighting  strength  of  the 
town  marshalled  in  defence,  and  the  schoolboys  in 
attack,  a  very  pretty  battle  royal,  in  which  little 
quarter  was  given,  was  waged  upon  each  recurring 
anniversary.  Combustibles  of  all  kinds  were  prepared 
beforehand,  and  armed  with  these  and  headed  by  the 


RUGBY  353 

champion  bruisers  of  the  school,  bearing  torches,  the 
attacking  hordes  fell  upon  the  civic  ranks  that  formed 
in  a  dense  circle  around  their  pile  of  faggots.  In 
addition  to  the  immortal  "  Tom  Brown  ",  which  dealt 
with  a  somewhat  more  orderly  and  organized  society 
than  that  presided  over  by  Wooll,  there  are  a  great 
many  reminiscences  of  Rugby  schooldays  both  of  the 
Arnold  and  the  pre-Arnold  period  extant  in  print.  But 
as  a  matter  of  fact  the  present  writer,  for  reasons  not 
relevant  here,  has  possibly  heard  as  much  as  anybody 
of  a  later  generation  now  living  of  the  Arnold  epoch 
from  the  lips  of  many  who  were  prominent  among  his 
pupils,  and  that  too  up  till  a  comparatively  recent 
day.  Such  a  confidence  may  seem  perhaps  super- 
fluous, as  such  tales  would  be  altogether  too  meticulous 
for  these  pages.  But  as  "  Tom  Brown  "  is  a  classic,  one 
or  two  remarks  may  not  be  untimely.  In  the  first 
place  one  has  been  confronted  through  life  with  the 
assertion  in  newspapers,  or  from  persons  of  more  or  less 
one's  own  generation,  that  this  character  was  so  and 
so,  and  that  was  such  a  one.  The  fact  is  generally 
derived  too  from  some  special  and  unerring  source  ! 
Probably  there  have  even  been  old  schoolfellows  of 
Mr.  Hughes's  who  have  entertained  themselves  and  their 
friends  by  fitting  names  to  types,  and  grown  into  such 
faith  byconstant  reiteration.  In  every  book  of  the  kind, 
above  all  in  one  so  famous,  the  habit  of  crossing  "t's" 
and  dotting  "i's  "  that  the  author  himself  never  intended 
to  cross  or  to  dot,  is  an  incurable  and  harmless  and  even 
natural  propensity.  But  I  can  only  say  that  of  the  late 
Judge  Hughes's  contemporaries  in  age  and  standing,  in 
short,  prominent  members  of  the  community  he  de- 
scribes, I  have  for  sufficient  reasons  been  intimately 
associated  with  several  till  the  end  of  their  lives,  and 
discussed  the  book  and  period  with  many  more.  And 
that  not  one  of  these  but  utterly  ridiculed  this  putting  of 
23 


354  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

names  to  "  Tom  Brown's  "  life-like  friends  and  enemies, 
highly  as  they  appraised  them  as  types.  Nor  was  it 
very  likely  that  an  author  who  lived  afterwards,  as 
did  Judge  Hughes,  so  much  in  touch  with  Rugby  and 
his  own  school  contemporaries  and  friends,  would  put 
any  of  them  bodily  into  a  book.  On  the  contrary, 
with  the  freedom  and  liberty  that  fiction  gives,  he 
would  take  particular  care  not  to  do  so.  But  that 
men  with  pardonable  vanity  should  fit  themselves  or 
be  fitted  by  their  descendants  on  to  the  characters  in 
so  famous  a  work  is  not  unnatural,  and  this  amiable 
weakness  will  probably  grow  as  time  goes  on.  Hence 
a  word  in  season  for  whatever  it  may  be  worth,  and 
it  seems  to  me  such  testimony  is  sufficiently  conclusive. 
The  "young  master",  who  holds  serious  discourse  with 
the  hero  on  the  cricket-field  before  he  goes  up  to  Oxford, 
was  quite  possibly  intended  for  Cotton,  the  second  Head- 
master of  Marlborough  and  Bishop  of  Calcutta.  It  is  at 
least  quite  certain  that  "  Bill  ",  the  schoolhouse  porter, 
who  gave  warning  of  the  doctor's  approach,  it  will  be 
remembered,  at  the  fight  between  Tom  and  Williams, 
was  William  Voss,  who  spent  the  latter  half  of  a  long 
life  as  lodge  porter  at  Marlborough.  There  could  be  no 
escaping  from  that.  Though  only  mentioned  as  an  article 
of  furniture  or  a  tree  might  be  mentioned,  and  for  that 
very  reason  beyond  suspicion  as  to  identity.  Bill  greatly 
enjoyed  the  indisputable  distinction.  Hundreds  of  suc- 
cessive new  boys  at  the  Wiltshire  school  gazed  with 
almost  awe  at  the  rubicund  face  and  portly  form  of  the 
veteran  who  had  actually  figured  in  the  famous  fight 
between  Tom  Brow^n  and  Slogger  Williams.  Of  course 
he  could  put  names  to  all  the  characters  in  the  book, 
and  had  known  the  originals  well,  his  precision  and  con- 
fidence in  this  respect  increasing  with  his  years.  And 
this  was  much  more  than  his  master  could  do,  though 
a  personal  friend  of  the  author  of  the  book  and  an  old 


RUGBY  355 

schoolfellow.  This  is  no  place  to  enlarge  on  the 
familiar  story  of  Arnold's  Rugby,  even  did  space 
permit.  But  as  the  average  man  is  vaguely  inclined 
to  fancy  that  Rugby  began  with  that  great  headmaster 
in  the  sense  that  Uppingham  and  its  thirty  boys 
began  with  Thring,  I  have  ventured  this  brief  narra- 
tion of  its  earlier  story.  Out  of  this  one  salient  fact 
may  at  least  be  taken  to  heart,  namely,  that  from  two  to 
four  hundred  boys,  of  the  same  degree  and  quality  as  the 
mass  who  went  to  Harrow  or  Winchester,  were  gathered 
mainly  in  boarding-houses  under  the  successive  reigns  of 
James,  Ingles,  and  Wooll,  and  thrived  or  suffered  under 
precisely  the  same  half-lax,  half-rigid  discipline.  Dr. 
Wooll,  though  a  small  and  genial  man,  had  a  tireless  arm, 
and  could  flog  a  whole  lower  form  of  forty  boys  straight 
off  the  reel,  it  seems,  without  a  sign  of  exhaustion. 

From  infancy  to  years  of  discretion  the  present 
writer  was  the  frequent  inmate  of  a  household  whose 
head  had  been  one  of  Wooll's  sixth  form.  And  if 
his  oft-told  reminiscences  or  the  writer's  memory  of 
them  will  not  pass  as  scientific  history,  the  annals  of 
Rugby  School  are  there  at  any  rate  to  bear  them  out, 
and  for  all  to  read  who  care  to.  The  public  schools, 
of  which  Rugby  beyond  question  was  held  as  one, 
though,  as  already  mentioned,  not  at  that  time  re- 
garded as  an  indispensable  introduction  to  life,  were 
yet  further  under  a  distinct  cloud  when  Arnold  came 
upon  the  scene.  He  was  fortunate  in  Rugby  as  an 
instrument.  It  was  sufficiently  large  and  important 
to  work  upon  without  being  hampered  by  invincible 
traditions.  Eton  would  probably  for  many  reasons 
have  been  too  big  a  job.  Westminster  was  hopeless 
from  its  situation.  Winchester,  his  own  school,  was 
the  very  slave  of  custom  and  inelastic  in  construction. 
Harrow  alone  would  in  all  likelihood  have  proved 
suitable  for  his  experiments,  and  responded,  as  Rugby 


356  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

responded,  to  his  reforming  touch.  But  Rugby,  the 
junior  of  the  five  in  prestige,  was  after  all  the  most 
eligible.  Situated  far  from  London,  but  in  the  heart 
of  England,  it  had  at  once  the  advantages  of  clean, 
rural  surroundings,  together  with  a  central  position, 
an  advantage  not  to  be  despised  in  the  coaching 
period.  Everybody  knows  Arnold's  methods,  for 
they  were  practically  those  that  have  now  long 
existed  at  every  great  school  in  the  country  :  A  sense 
of  honour  instead  of  fear  of  the  birch  ;  a  more  friendly 
feeling  between  boys  and  masters  ;  a  sixth  form  with 
obligations  and  responsibilities  besides  mere  privileges. 
But  there  is  no  occasion  to  pursue  this  subject. 
Visitors  to  Rugby  will  seldom  probably  trouble  their 
heads  about  such  things.  But  many,  and  certainly 
most  of  those  from  across  the  Atlantic,  will  enter 
the  old  pre-Arnold  quadrangle,  and  the  schoolhouse 
dining -hall,  before  whose  capacious  fireplace  the  famous 
roasting  scene  in  Tom  Brown  is  laid.  They  will  duly 
make  their  pilgrimage  to  the  hero's  study,  which 
at  least  is  a  thing  of  certainty,  and  not  as  Shake- 
speare's desk  at  Stratford  grammar  school,  or  Geoffrey 
of  Monmouth's  reputed  sanctum  beside  the  Wye, 
problematical  or  legendary.  They  will  look  out,  too, 
for  the  turret  door  descending  from  the  doctor's 
study  into  the  Close,  recalling  an  incident  in  that  book 
which  for  many  of  them  is  the  inspiring  cause  of  their 
pilgrimage  to  Rugby.  They  will  assuredly  stroll  a 
little  in  the  Close  itself  amid  the  survivors  of  those 
once  numerous  elms  that  but  two  decades  agone 
made  these  classic  meads  the  glory  of  Rugby  ;  the 
one  picturesque  and  stately  scene  that  redeemed 
and  more  than  redeemed  the  slightly  commonplace 
though  not  undignified  erections  of  successive  adminis- 
trators of  Laurence  Sherriff's  trust,  and  the  undeni- 
ably commonplace  atmosphere  of  the  little  Midland 


RUGBY  357 

town  spreading  northward  from  its  gates.  It  is  a 
matter  of  common  knowledge  that  the  very  earliest 
impressions  of  one's  life  sometimes  abide  in  the  vision 
with  preternatural  clarity.  The  temptation  to  record 
the  unimportant  fact  that  the  football  on  Old  Bigside 
at  Rugby  is  the  one  that  thus  above  all  other  remains 
with  me  is  irresistible,  while  standing  here  upon  the 
very  spot.  Nor  has  any  amount  of  after  familiarity 
with  very  similar  scenes  elsewhere  dimmed  the 
freshness  with  which  it  still  comes  back  ;  the  long, 
loose  array  of  black-coated  and,  I  think,  top-hatted 
fags  "  standing  in  goal  "  according  to  the  curious 
ancient  custom.  The  glimpses  caught  between  them 
of  the  Homeric  contest,  the  battle  of  giants,  as  it 
seemed  to  a  child,  a  shifting  hurly-burly  of  jerseys, 
with  their  lateral  stripes  of  blue  or  red  ;  the  gor- 
geous peaked  caps  of  crimson,  blue,  or  green  velvet, 
laced  and  tasselled  with  silver  cord,  and  in  those 
days  worn  in  action,  now  vulgarized  but  then  unknown 
outside  Rugby  Close.  The  background  of  tall  elms 
shedding  their  yellow  leaves  into  that  murky  November 
air  so  chronic  in  the  Midlands  ;  the  faint  smell  of  mud 
from  the  soft,  much-trampled  turf  ;  the  dull  thud  of  the 
then  more  frequent  drop-kick  ;  the  prolonged  and  pro- 
digious scrimmages  of  three  or  four  score  combatants. 
All  these  impressions — these  sights  and  sounds  and 
smells — survive  in  an  absurd  degree  later  and  greater 
intimacies  with  such  familiar  things,  and  I  only  venture 
to  record  them  because  they  come  from  Rugby  Close  in 
the  last  year  or  two  of  its  exclusive  possession  of  them, 
and  a  period  so  deplorably  remote  that  there  may 
even  still  have  been  a  stray  Old  Rugbeian  joining  in 
the  fray  who  had  been  in  the  school  under  Arnold. 

Of  the  many  new  buildings,  including  the  imposing 
fabric  which  covers  the  site  of  the  plain  old  chapel 
where  Arnold  preached  to  Tom  Brown  and  his  friends. 


358  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 

erected  in  the  later  nineteenth  century,  there  is  no 
occasion  to  speak.  Rugby  School  at  this  active 
building  period  delivered  itself  over  to  Mr.  Butter- 
field,  fired  perhaps  by  his  achievement  of  Keble 
College,  Oxford.  Its  chief  historian  says  these  build- 
ings "  must  be  seen  to  be  appreciated  ",  with  which 
enigmatic  piece  of  criticism  we  will  leave  them  to 
the  verdict  of  the  curious  stranger,  who  will  possibly 
be  of  the  opinion  that  the  yet  later  efforts  of  this 
prosperous  foundation  are  altogether  in  a  happier  vein. 

The  old  town  of  Rugby  is  assuredly  commonplace 
enough.  Laurence  Sherriff's  almshouses,  where  the 
original  schoolhouse  stood  fronting  the  market-place, 
relieves  somewhat  the  uninspiring  but  inoffensive 
vista  that  carries  the  eye  down  the  straight,  narrow 
High  Street  to  where  the  lofty,  turreted  gateway  of 
the  present  school  makes  a  rather  imposing  and  quite 
felicitous  termination.  Rugby  was  in  fact  rather  a 
poor  little  town  of  some  thousand  and  odd  souls  till  the 
coaching  period  added  to  its  importance.  The  expan- 
sion of  the  school,  railroad  industries,  and  a  moderate 
residential  increment  from  hunting  and  more  recent 
polo  facilities  have  greatly  extended  its  borders. 
If  Leland  were  turned  loose  again  in  England  he  would 
doubtless  note  it  as  "a  nete  and  pratey  town".  But  its 
heart  is  all  that  is  in  the  least  likely  to  interest  the  visitor, 
and  that  too  almost  wholly  from  its  scholastic  associa- 
tions. The  churches  are  new  or  rebuilt,  save  the  rather 
remarkable  old  fourteenth  century  tower  of  St.  Andrews. 

All  the  world  knows  the  L.  &  N.  W.  R.  station, 
placed  at  that  respectful  distance  which  mistrust- 
ful burghers  in  many  places,  abetted  here  by  yet 
more  mistrustful  pedagogues,  insisted  on  to  their 
later  remorse,  when  the  iron  horse  was  a  new  and 
fearful  thing.  Beyond  a  medley  of  unsightly  railroad 
works  the  passenger  can  still  mark  the  current  of  the 


RUGBY  359 

little  Avon  where  the  Swift  joins  it  in  the  meadows 
towards  Brownsover.  And  yet  more  intimately  as  the 
train  runs  out  on  its  northward  journey  the  reinforced 
but  still  modest  river  will  display  for  a  brief  space  its 
leisurely  meanderings  by  level  meads  and  gently 
rising  woodland.  Save  for  the  reputed  fact,  that 
Izaak  Walton  haunted  its  banks  hereabouts,  its 
interest  for  the  wayfarer  must  depend,  like  that  of  the 
town,  on  its  associations  with  many  past  generations 
of  Rugby  schoolboys.  For  in  all  the  periods  pre- 
ceding that  later  one  which  witnessed  the  organiza- 
tion of  athletics,  the  gentle  art  seems  to  have  been  a 
ruling  passion  with  fag  and  master,  with  scholar  and 
sportsman ;  the  further  zest  of  excursions  into  forbidden 
ground  and  stimulating  differences  with  gamekeepers 
adding  no  doubt  to  its  fascinations.  Samuel  Butler 
we  know  watched  his  float  assiduously  in  these  gentle 
streams,  composing  perhaps  those  Latin  verses  which 
so  delighted  his  brilliant  teacher,  the  first  Dr.  James, 
whom  he  was  himself  far  to  excel.  His  oddly  assorted 
study  partner,  Charles  Apperley,  already  mentioned, 
tells  us  so  much  and  a  good  deal  more  besides  of  this 
late  eighteenth  century  life  at  a  public  school.  Doubt- 
less the  ill-satisfied  stomach  of  the  youngster  of  those 
Spartan  days  had  something  to  say  both  to  his  sport- 
ing and  predatory  instinct.  For  we  have  a  quaint 
picture  of  that  strange  genius,  Walter  Savage  Landor, 
whose  clever  and  audacious  sallies  in  Greek  or  Latin 
were  by  turn  the  delight  and  the  torment  of  the  same 
head-master,  till  he  could  stand  them  no  longer  and 
sent  the  terrible  youth  packing.  But  in  regard  to  the 
Avon,  Landor  obviously  belonged  to  the  pot-hunting 
school  of  fishermen,  for  he  is  recalled  as  prowling 
along  its  banks,  his  fag  (the  father  of  Charles  Reade,  the 
novelist)  toiling  painfully  beside  him  with  a  casting- 
net.     After  each  cast,  so  far  fruitless,  made  by  Landor, 


36o  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE^S  COUNTRY 

he  addressed  the  astonished  new  boy  in  dark,  whimsical 
words  as  a  person  of  ill-cmen,  foreshadowing  unmis- 
takably a  castigation  if  his  evil  star  remained  much 
longer  in  the  ascendant.  Landor  then  proceeded  into 
a  preserve,  brushing  aside  the  objection  of  a  remon- 
strating yokel,  and  at  the  first  cast  hauled  in  a  fine  pike. 
With  a  triumphant  shout  he  turned  to  his  small  hench- 
man, "  Welcome  to  Rugby,  sir,  welcome  !  You  are  a 
boy  of  excellent  omen.  I'll  carry  the  net  home,  and  you 
shall  sup  off  this  fish.  It  is  the  joint  production  of 
my  skill  and  your  favourable  star  ".  Next  day,  this 
whimsical  being,  who  was  the  protector  of  fags,  and 
even  paid  his  own  a  fixed  salary  of  threepence  a  week, 
was  summoned  for  poaching.  It  is  related  that  on 
another  occasion,  when  assailed  by  a  farmer  whose 
water  he  was  laying  under  contribution,  he  threw  his 
net  over  him  with  such  precision  as  to  reduce  the  irate 
agriculturist  to  a  helpless  and  ignominious  position. 
With  such  light  trifles  anent  one  or  two  of  the  many 
celebrities  of  later  days  who  have  sported  in  its  waves  or 
on  its  banks,  we  may  take  our  leave  of  the  infant  Avon. 
Certainly  such  distinction  as  it  may  have  hereabouts  in 
the  eyes  of  a  stranger  could  only  be  derived  from  such 
associations.  Between  here  and  the  field  of  Naseby ,  where 
it  rises,  it  has  contributed  many  a  tale  of  woe  and  triumph 
to  the  annals  of  the  Py tchley  Hunt — the  typical,  willow- 
bordered  Warwickshire  brook  of  the  sporting  artist, 
towards  and  over  which  a  scarlet-coated  cavalcade  goes 
galloping  in  mad  career.  But  otherwise  no  stranger  is 
ever  likely  to  trace  or  to  wish  to  trace  the  Avon  above 
Rugby.  Unlike  Edgehill,  nobody  but  a  stray  historical 
student,  I  fancy,  ever  penetrates  to  the  field  of  Naseby. 
And  if  they  did,  unless  my  memory  betrays  me,  they 
would  be  quite  unlikely  to  note  the  fact  that  from  the 
cold  ridge,  upon  which  raged  that  famous  fight,  there 
oozes  out  the  infant  spring  of  Shakespeare's  Avon. 


INDEX 


Alcester,  215,  225,  227,  230 
Alcote  Park,  269 
Alderminster,  269 
Alne  River,  230 
Alveston,  309 
Apperley,  247,  359 
Arden,  forest  of,  228 

„      Mary,  230,  231,  251 

„      Robert,  251 
Arnold,  Dr.,  341,  343,  356,  357 
Ashton-under-the-Hill,  81 
Aston-Subedge,  187,  192 
Atherstone,  268 
Aubrey,  John,  246 

Badsey,  196 

Banbury  stone,  66,  71 

Bardon  Hill,  231 

Barford,  308,  309 

Barker,  62 

Bates,  230,  297 

Baxter,  Robert,  201 

Bayliss,  140 

Beauchamps,  the,  11,  12,  16, 

313,  321,  324 
Beaudesert  Church,  228,  292 
Beaufort,  John,  21 
Bengeworth,  108,  137,  153 
Benson,  Archbishop,  41 
Bernardi,  153 
Bidford,  217,  223-226 
Bigg  family,  204 
Birlingham,  78,  79 
Birthplace,  the,  241-246 
Bisshopp  family,  273 
Bonner,  Bishop,  81 
Boteler,  Ralph,  121 


Brackeridge,  56 
Brailes,  272,  273 
Bredon,  52-55,  81 
Bredon  Hill,  2,  50,  52,  63-72,  79, 
80,81,  loi,  109,   no,   117,  169, 

231,  303 
Bretforton,  196 
Brihtric,  King,  6,  16 

„        Thegn,  7 
Broadway,  127,  130,  176-188 
Brooke,  Lord  Willoughby  de,  289 

„       Lord,  314,  322 
Brooksby,  Mrs.,  296 
Brown,  223,  269 
Bund,  Willis,  153 
Butler,  Dr.  Samuel,  347,  348,  349, 

359 
Butler  ("  Hudibras  "),  62,  63 
Butterworth,  46,  48 

Cannings  family,  197 
Caractacus,  68 
Carews,  the,  240 
Catesby,  72,  230,  295 
Chadbury,  168 
Chandos  family,  125,  126 
Charlecote,  304,  306 

,,  Walter  de,  305 

Charles    I,    36,  86,  95,   117,    151, 

277,  288,  336,  339 
Charles  H,  37,  173,  224,  303 
Charlton,  99,  100,  103 
Chipping  Campden,  117,  187,  188 
Clarence,  Duke  of,  1 1,  23,  93 
Clarendon,  Lord,  283,  286 
Clares,  the,  10,  11,  12,  17 
Cleeve  Hill,  i,  119,  231 
361 


362  THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 


Cleeve  Mill,  84,  205 

Cleeve  Prior,  198,  216,  217,  218 

Clififord  Chambers,  267,  268 

Clopton  family,  240,  248,  255,  293 
„        House,  293,  294,  296 

Comberton,  Great,  73,  79 

„  Little,  73>  79j  81 

Combe,  John,  239,  269 

Compton  Winyates,  264,  265 
„        family,  275-278 
„        Verney,  289,  290 

Conderton  camp,  71 

Cornivii,  68,  116 

Cotswolds,  I,  2,  50,  55,  64,  66,  67, 
68,  69,  96,  109,  no,  113-119, 
127,  129,  169,  177,  180,  186, 
192-218,  232,  264,  303 

Cotton,  Bishop,  354 

Coughton,  230,  296 

Courtney  family,  21,  24 

Coventry,  Earl  of,  80 

Cranborne,  9 

Creighton,  Bishop,  91 

Crofts,  23 

Cromwell,  38,  39,  288 

Cropthorne,  97,  98-104 

Crossfield,  346 

Culpepper  family,  171 

Deerhurst,  43-48 

Dent  family,  126 

Despensers,  the,  11,  12,  16,  17,313 

Digby,  230,  296,  297 

Dinely  family,  99-103 

Drayton,  172 

Dryden,  172 

Dudleys,  the,  313,  318,  324,  325, 

339 
Dumbleton,  116 

„  Hill,  118 

Dunsmuir  Heath,  297,  352 

Ealdred,  Bishop,  48 
Earls  Croome,  61 
Eckington,  T'})-,  7^ 
Edgehill,  232,  265 

„         battle  of,  278-303 
Edward  the  Confessor,  90,  143 
Edward  II,  313,  334 


Edward  III,  146 

IV,  20-24,  121,  313 
„         VI,  247,  335 
„         Prince,  20,  23 
Egwin,    Bishop,    140,    141,    142, 

146 
Elcho,  Lord,  129 
Elizabeth,  Queen,  122,  275,  313, 

322,  334,  335 
Elmley  Castle,  JS^  80 
Eoves,  140,  141 
Essex,  Lord,  37,  95,  280-288 
Ethelfleda,  312 
Ettington,  270 
Evans,  H.  A.,  186 
Evesham,   66,   67,   97,   107,   108, 
109,   114,    117,    118,   126,    131, 
134,    137-168,    169,    170,    187, 
192,  193,  197,  198,  199,215 
Evesham,  fruit  culture,  157-168 
„         battle  of,  146-148 
„  siege  of,  150-153 

Exhall,  223,  227 

Falkland,  Lord,  96 

Fawkes,  Guy,  294 

Feldon,  the,  228,  272 

Fielding,  39 

Fitzhamon,  Robert,  5-9,  16 

Fladbury,  97,  99,  104,  198 

Fleetwood,  Gen.,  38,  39 

Foote,  Samuel,  103,  104,  108 

Fortescue,  284 

Freeman,  Prof.,  7,  47}  9i>  H^ 

Fullbrook  Castle,  275 

Garnet,  Father,  230,  296 

Gastrell,  249 

Gaveston,  Piers,  313,  316,  317 

Glamorgan,  5,  6,  7,  8 

Goodyear,  103 

Goshng,  54 

Grafton,  223 

Grant,  296-300 

Graves  family,  193 

Greathead  family,  332 

Greenway,  Father,  230,  296 

Gretton,  118 

Greville,  Fulke,  313,  319 


INDEX 


363 


Greville  family,  314 
Grey,  Lady  Jane,  122 
Greys,  the,  21,  23 
Guy  of  Warwick,  331 
Guy's  Cliff,  331,  332 

Habington,  118,  180,  296 

Hailes  Abbey,  128 

Halford,  271 

Hall  family,  238,  239,  242,  250 

Hampden,  285 

Hampton,  105,  137,  i44 

Hampton  Lucy,  307,  308 

Hanford  family,  73,  74 

Hanley  Castle,  7 

Hart  family,  242,  243 

Hart,  Father,  299 

Hartlebury,  92 

Harvard  family,  255 

Harvey,  287 

Harvington,  205 

Hathaway,  Anne,  227,  238,  243 

Hawkins,  320 

Henley-in-Arden,  227,  228,  292 

Henrietta,  Maria  Queen,  250,  278 

Henry  I,  12,  334 

„      ni,  128,  147,  201,  334 
VI,  26 

]]      Vlil,  8,  13,  117,  204,247, 

274, 275, 277 

Hertford,  Marquis  of,  215 
Hill,  Sir  R.,  339 
Hillborough,  223,  226 
Hinton,  134 

Hoby  family,  193,  197,  204 
Holme  Castle,  9 
Holyoak,  346 
Honeybourne,  192-196 
Honnington  Park,  272 
Huddington,  72,  295 
Hughes,  Judge,  353,  354 
Hunt,  54 
Hyde,  336 

lago,  302 

Icknield  way,  192,  217 
Ingles,  349 
Isbourne  Brook,  133 

James  I,  139,  171,  3i3,  3^9 


James  II,  155 

„     Dr.,  347,  348,  349,  359 

„     Henry,  243 
John,  King,  10,  225 
JoUyfife,  247 
Jones,  Inigo,  129 

Katherine     Parr    (Queen),     117, 

121-125 
Kemerton  camp,  71 
Kenilworth,  332-337 
Kineton,  280-285 
Kinwarton,  230 
Knowle  End,  287 

Landor,  W.  S.,  78,  322,  359,  360 

Lane,  Miss,  303 

Lane,  N.,  308 

Lapworth,  295 

Leamington,  311,  324,  325,  326 

„  river,  326 

Legge,  Colonel,  150-153 
Leicester,  Earl  of,  324,  334,  335, 

336 
Leigh  family,  338,  339,  346 
Leland,  138 

Lench,  Rouse,  199,  201,  202,  203 
„       Church,  200,  201 
„       Hob,  200 
„       Atch,  200 
„       SherrifPs,  200 
Lenchwick,  200 
Lichfield,  Abbot,    138,    139,    I45> 

148,  149 
Lindsay,  Earl  of,  285,  314,  318 
Littleton,  Middle,  221 

„         South,  221 
Llewelyn,  Prince,  225 
Lloyd,  105,  106,  107 
Long  Marston,  223,  224 
Lucy  family,  305,  306,  307 
Lygon  family,  180 
Lyttleton  family,  221,  296-300 

Mabel  of  Gloucester,  9 

Macready,  347 

Malvern  Hills,  32-35,  66,  1 1 1, 1 16, 

169,  231 
Margaret,  Queen,  20-24 


364    THE  AVON  AND  SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 


Marleburg,  Dean,  145 

Marie  Cliff,  216 

Marriott  family,  290 

Martin  family,  81 

Mary,  Queen,  307,  308 

Massey,  George,  36,  38,  125,  150- 

153 
Maurice,  Prmce,  178 
Meon  Hill,  270,  303 
Mickleton,  187 
Middle  Hill,  186 
Montfort,    Simon    de,    146,    147, 

148,  305,  333,  334 
Mordaunt  family,  290 
Mowbray,  23 
Mythe,  the,  56 

Nafford,  79 

Nash,  Dr.,  61,  72,  104,  193 

„     Thomas,  238 
Nesta,  9 
Netherton,  81 
Neve,  287 

Neville,  Richard,  313,  324 
New  Place,  243,  248 
Noaks,  92 

Northampton,  Earl  of,  264 
Northbrooke,  296,  297 
Norton,  Abbots,  203,  204,  205 

Odda,  48,  89 
Offenham,  147 
Ombersley,  Abbot,  221 
Orleans,  Duke  of,  99,  108,  204 
Overbury,  81 
Oxenton,  116 

Parker  family,  272 

Parr,  Earl  of  Northampton,  321 

Pebworth,  223 

Percy,  Thomas,  297-300 

„      Lord  A.,  332 
Pershore,  66,  67,  81-97,  147 
„         Monastery,  88-91 
Philip  II,  308 
Phillipps,  Halliwell,  239 
Phillips  family,  181 
Prideaux,  Bishop,  53,  54 
Pye  family,  94 


Radway,  287,  288 
Ragley,  215 
Reade  family,  53,  55 
Richard  III,  21,  23,  313 
Ridgeway,  the,  169 
Robert  of  Gloucester,  9,  10 
Robsart,  Amy,  335 
Roger,  Abbot,  144,  145 
Romans,  the,  68 
Rookwood,  291 
Rouse  family,  201 
Rugby,  297,  358 

„       School,  340-360 
Rupert,  Prince,  37,  96,  151,  178, 

281-289 
Russells,  the,  56-59 

Salford  Priors,  84,  205,  275 
Sandys  family,  107,  171-175 
Savage  family,  80,  179,  185 
Scott,  Sir  Gilbert,  89,  126 
Sedgebarrow,  1 31-134 
Selden,  61 
Severn,  river,  i,  7,  21,  31,  36-44, 

68-71,  115, 116 
Seymour,  Thos.,  121,  122 
Shakespeare,  John,  242,  246,  249 
Shakespeare,  William,  69,  70,  227, 

230,  233-259,  302,  305,  308 
Sheffield,  Lady,  335 
Shelden  family,  179,  273 
Sherriff,  Laurence,  344,  345 
Shipstone-on-Stone,  273 
Shirley  family,  270,  271 
Silurians,  the,  68 
Skipwith  family,  214,  215,  225 
Smith  family,  221 
Snitterfield,  250,  302 
Somerset,  Duke  of,  20-24 
„  Protectors,  121 

Somerville,  228,  243 
Spencers,  the,  276,  277,  278 
Stanford,  130 
Stanley,  Pontlarge,  118 
Stan  way,  129 
Stoneleigh,  338,  339 
Stour,  river,  264,  268,  270,  27 1 
Stratford,  231-66 

„      Church,  237-241 


INDEX 


365 


Strensham,  55-63 
Strickland,  Miss,  123,  125 
Sudely,  117,  121-126 
Swift,  river,  359 
Symonds,  105,  107 

Talbots,  the,  296,  324 
Taylor  family,  185 
Teddington  Hands,  116,  117,  118 
Tewkesbury,  1-37,  109,  no,  in, 

113,  "5,  116 
Tewkesbury  Abbey  Church,  1 2-20 
Thornburgh,  Bishop,  92,  93 
Throckmorton  family,  105,  230,296 

„  Manor,  105 

Treadway,  Rev.,  125 
Tresham,  F.,  300 
Trevelyan,  Sir  G.,  301 
Tudor,  Jasper,  21,  23 
Turner,  335 
Twining,  52 
Tysoe,  278 

Upton-on-Severn,  38 

Verney,  Sir  E.,  285 
„       family,  289 

Walcote,  231 
Walker,  Sir  E.,  240 
Walton  Hall,  290 
Walton,  Izaak,  359 
Warwick,  309-326 

„        Castle,  3n-3i8 


Warwick  Church,  320-325 
Wasperton,  308,  309 
Washbourne,  118 
Washington,  Penelope,  171 

„  Henry,  174 

Welcombe  Lodge,  300 
Welford,  223 
Wellesbourne,  290 

„  brook,  304 

Wenlock,  Lord,  21,  23 
West,  James,  269 
Weston  Subedge,  187 
Wick,  97,  98 
Wickenford,  118 
Wickhamford,  170 
Willersley,  187 
William  I,  91,  146 

„       11,7 
„       HI,  156 

Wilmecote,  230,  231,  251 
Wilmot,  Gen.,  284 
Winchcomb,  07-121,  126,  128 
Winnington  family,  180 
Wixford,  223,  226,  227 
Wolsey,  145 
Wood  Norton,  99,  108 
Wooll,  Dr.,  351 
Woollas  Hall,  72,  y;^ 
Wootton  Wawen,  228,  243 
Wrights,  the,  296-300 
Wulfstan,  Bishop,  91,  143 
Wyatt,  172 
Wyntour  family,  72,  295-300 


Printed  by 

Morrison  &  Gins  Limited 

Edinburgh 


Date 


Hour 


NOTIS  OCT0  7B96 

RETD  SEP9.8W9615 
RETO  SEP  3  01996  2  7 


Mf.-rre 


3  1205  00148  5927 


to. 


A  A      000  240  432    5 


